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前言：

环境能源和可耻寻发展，实际上最终解决的是能源的利用率问题。通过限制或者控制能源源头的碳排放量来控制降碳。

那么问题来了，在古代，电是怎么来的呢？整个发电工业又是如何演变的呢？如果我们想要降碳，那么未来的电力和动力系统，又是怎么样的呢？我们已经离不开电力的基础设施，现代社会的生活也无法离开电力供应。带着这样那样的疑问，开始本次旅行。

History of Power: The Evolution of the Electric Generation Industry

电力的历史:发电工业的演变

POWER magazine was launched in 1882, just as the world was beginning to grasp the implications of a new, versatile form of energy: electricity. During its 140-year history, the magazine’s pages have reflected the fast-changing evolution of the technologies and markets that characterize the world’s power sector. These are some of the events that have shaped both the history of power and the history of POWER.

《电力》杂志创刊于1882年，当时世界刚刚开始认识到一种新的、多用途的能源:电力。在其140年的历史中，该杂志的页面反映了世界电力行业技术和市场快速变化的演变。这些事件塑造了权力的历史和权力的历史。

The history of power generation is long and convoluted, marked by myriad technological milestones, conceptual and technical, from hundreds of contributors. Many accounts begin power’s story at the demonstration of electric conduction by Englishman Stephen Gray, which led to the 1740 invention of glass friction generators in Leyden, Germany. That development is said to have inspired Benjamin Franklin’s famous experiments, as well as the invention of the battery by Italy’s Alessandro Volta in 1800, Humphry Davy’s first effective “arc lamp” in 1808, and in 1820, Hans Christian Oersted’s demonstration of the relationship between electricity and magnetism. In 1820, in arguably the most pivotal contribution to modern power systems, Michael Faraday and Joseph Henry invented a primitive electric motor, and in 1831, documented that an electric current can be produced in a wire moving near a magnet—demonstrating the principle of the generator.

发电的历史是漫长而曲折的，标志着无数的技术里程碑，概念和技术，来自数百个贡献者。许多记载都是从英国人斯蒂芬·格雷(Stephen Gray)对导电的演示开始的，这导致了1740年在德国莱顿(Leyden)发明玻璃摩擦发电机。据说，这一发展启发了本杰明·富兰克林的著名实验，以及1800年意大利的亚历山德罗·伏塔发明的电池，1808年汉弗莱·戴维发明的第一盏有效的“弧光灯”，以及1820年汉斯·克里斯蒂安·奥斯特对电和磁之间关系的论证。1820年，迈克尔·法拉第(Michael Faraday)和约瑟夫·亨利(Joseph Henry)发明了一种原始的电动机，这可以说是对现代电力系统最关键的贡献。1831年，他们记录了在靠近磁铁的导线中可以产生电流——这证明了发电机的原理。

Invention of the first rudimentary dynamo is credited to Frenchman Hippolyte Pixii in 1832. Antonio Pacinotti improved it to provide continuous direct-current (DC) power by 1860. In 1867, Werner von Siemens, Charles Wheatstone, and S.A. Varley nearly simultaneously devised the “self-exciting dynamo-electric generator.” Perhaps the most important improvement then arrived in 1870, when a Belgian inventor, Zenobe Gramme, devised a dynamo that produced a steady DC source well-suited to powering motors—a discovery that generated a burst of enthusiasm about electricity’s potential to light and power the world.

第一台基本的发电机是1832年法国人希波利特·皮xii发明的。到1860年，安东尼奥·帕西诺蒂对其进行了改进，提供了连续的直流电。1867年，Werner von Siemens, Charles Wheatstone和S.A. Varley几乎同时设计了“自激发电机”。也许最重要的进步发生在1870年，比利时发明家泽诺贝·格拉姆发明了一种发电机，可以产生稳定的直流电源，非常适合为电机提供动力。这一发现引发了人们对电力在照明和为世界供电方面的潜力的热情。

By 1877—as the streets of many cities across the world were being lit up by arc lighting (but not ordinary rooms because arc lights were still blindingly bright)—Ohio-based Charles F. Brush had developed and begun selling the most reliable dynamo design to that point, and a host of forward thinkers were actively exploring the promise of large-scale electricity distribution. Eventually, Thomas Edison invented a less powerful incandescent lamp in 1879, and in September 1882—only a month before the inaugural issue of POWER magazine was published—he established a central generating station at Pearl Street (Figure 1) in lower Manhattan.

到1877年，当世界上许多城市的街道都被电弧照明照亮时(但不是普通的房间，因为电弧灯仍然亮得刺眼)，俄亥俄州的查尔斯·f·布拉什已经开发并开始销售最可靠的发电机设计，一群前瞻性的思想家正在积极探索大规模配电的前景。最终，托马斯·爱迪生在1879年发明了功率较小的白炽灯，并在1882年9月——仅在《POWER》杂志创刊号的一个月前——他在曼哈顿下城的珍珠街(图1)建立了一个中央发电站。

Pearl Street Station. Thomas Edison in September 1882 achieved his vision of a full-scale central power station with a system of conductors to distribute electricity to end-users in the high-profile business district in New York City. Source: U.S. Department of Energy 珍珠街站。1882年9月，托马斯·爱迪生(Thomas Edison)实现了他的设想:在纽约市备受瞩目的商业区，建造一座规模全面的中央发电站，用导线系统将电力输送给最终用户。资料来源:美国能源部

A History Rooted in Coal

根植于煤炭的历史

Advances in alternating-current (AC) technology opened up new realms for power generation (see sidebar “Tesla and the War of the Currents”). Hydropower, for example, marked several milestones between 1890 and 1900 in Oregon, Colorado, Croatia (where the first complete multiphase AC system was demonstrated in 1895), at Niagara Falls, and in Japan.

交流(AC)技术的进步为发电开辟了新的领域(参见侧栏“特斯拉和电流之战”)。例如，1890年至1900年间，水力发电在俄勒冈州、科罗拉多州、克罗地亚(1895年在那里展示了第一个完整的多相交流系统)、尼亚加拉瀑布和日本标志着几个里程碑。

Tesla and the War of the Currents

特斯拉和潮流之战

Today, most people recognize the name Tesla as a company that makes electric vehicles, but the real genius behind the name is not Elon Musk—it’s the Serbian-American engineer and physicist Nikola Tesla. Tesla, for all intents and purposes, was the man who pioneered today’s modern alternating-current (AC) electricity supply system.

今天，大多数人认为特斯拉是一家制造电动汽车的公司，但这个名字背后真正的天才并不是埃隆·马斯克，而是塞尔维亚裔美国工程师和物理学家尼古拉·特斯拉。无论从哪个角度来看，特斯拉都是当今现代交流供电系统的先驱。

Tesla was born in 1856 in Smiljan, Croatia, which was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the time. He studied math and physics at the Technical University of Graz in Austria, and also studied philosophy for a time at the University of Prague in what is now the Czech Republic. In 1882, he moved to Paris and got a job repairing direct-current (DC) power plants with the Continental Edison Co. Two years later, he immigrated to the U.S., where he became a naturalized citizen in 1889.

特斯拉于1856年出生在当时属于奥匈帝国的克罗地亚的斯米利扬。他在奥地利格拉茨技术大学学习数学和物理，并在布拉格大学(现捷克共和国)学习了一段时间的哲学。1882年，他移居巴黎，在大陆爱迪生公司找到了一份修理直流电电厂的工作。两年后，他移民到美国，并于1889年加入美国国籍。

Upon arrival in the U.S., Tesla found a job working for Thomas Edison in New York City, which he did for about a year. Edison was reportedly impressed by Tesla’s skill and work ethic, but the two men were much different in their methods and temperament. Tesla solved many problems through visionary revelations; whereas, Edison relied more on practical experiments and trial-and-error. Furthermore, Tesla believed strongly that AC electrical systems were more practical for large-scale power delivery; whereas, Edison championed DC systems in what has since come to be known as the “War of the Currents.”

抵达美国后，特斯拉在纽约为托马斯·爱迪生(Thomas Edison)找到了一份工作，他在那里工作了大约一年。据报道，爱迪生对特斯拉的技能和职业道德印象深刻，但这两个人在方法和气质上有很大不同。特斯拉通过有远见的启示解决了许多问题;而爱迪生更依赖于实际实验和试错法。此外，特斯拉坚信交流电力系统更适合大规模电力输送;然而，爱迪生在后来被称为“电流之战”的直流系统中支持直流系统。

Tesla left Edison’s company following a payment dispute over one of Tesla’s dynamo improvements. After his departure, Tesla struggled for a time to find funding to start his own business. When he finally did get his company going, Tesla moved quickly, and over the span of about two years he was granted more than 30 patents for his inventions, which included a whole polyphase system of AC dynamos, transformers, and motors.

特斯拉离开了爱迪生的公司，因为特斯拉的一项发电机改进引起了付款纠纷。在他离开后，特斯拉有一段时间很难找到创业的资金。当他的公司终于开始运转时，特斯拉行动迅速，在大约两年的时间里，他的发明获得了30多项专利，其中包括一整套由交流发电机、变压器和电动机组成的多相系统。

Word of Tesla’s innovative ideas spread, leading to an invitation for him to speak before the American Institute of Electrical Engineers. It was here that Tesla caught the eye of George Westinghouse, another AC power pioneer. Soon thereafter, Westinghouse bought the rights to Tesla’s patents and momentum for AC systems picked up.

特斯拉的创新理念传开了，他被邀请在美国电气工程师协会发表演讲。正是在这里，特斯拉引起了另一位交流电先驱乔治·威斯汀豪斯的注意。此后不久，西屋公司购买了特斯拉的专利权，交流电系统的发展势头开始回升。

Perhaps the most important battle in the War of the Currents occurred in 1893 during the World’s Columbian Exposition, the official name of the World’s Fair that year, held in Chicago, Illinois. Westinghouse’s company won the bid over Edison’s company to power the fair with electricity, and it did so with Tesla’s polyphase system.

也许在“海流之战”中最重要的战役发生在1893年在伊利诺斯州芝加哥市举行的世界哥伦比亚博览会期间，这是当年世界博览会的官方名称。威斯汀豪斯的公司击败了爱迪生的公司，赢得了为博览会提供电力的竞标，而它使用的是特斯拉的多相系统。

Among the exhibits (Figure 2) displayed at the fair were a switchboard, polyphase generators, step-up transformers, transmission lines, step-down transformers, industrial-sized induction motors and synchronous motors, rotary DC converters, meters, and other auxiliary devices. The demonstration allowed the public to see what an AC power system could look like and what it would be capable of doing. The fact that power could be transmitted over long distances, and utilized even to supply DC systems, opened many peoples’ eyes to the benefits it could provide and spurred movement toward a nationwide AC-powered grid.

在博览会上展出的展品(图2)包括配电盘、多相发电机、升压变压器、输电线路、降压变压器、工业规模的感应电动机和同步电动机、旋转直流变换器、仪表和其他辅助设备。这次演示让公众看到了交流电力系统的样子，以及它能做什么。电力可以远距离传输，甚至可以用来供应直流系统，这一事实使许多人看到了它所能提供的好处，并推动了全国交流电网的发展。

A Display Filled with Innovation. Westinghouse Electric Corp. exhibit of electric motors built on Nikola Tesla’s patent, and demonstrations of how they function, at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition (World’s Fair) in Chicago, Illinois. Also exhibited (front, center) are early Tesla Coils and parts from his high-frequency alternator. Courtesy: Detre Library & Archives, Heinz History Center 一个充满创新的展示。西屋电气公司在1893年伊利诺斯州芝加哥市举行的哥伦比亚世界博览会上展示了基于尼古拉·特斯拉专利制造的电动机，并演示了它们的工作原理。同时展出的(前，中)是早期的特斯拉线圈和零件，从他的高频交流发电机。提供:德雷图书馆和档案馆，亨氏历史中心

In addition to his electrical inventions, Tesla also experimented with X-rays, gave short-range demonstrations of radio communication, and built a radio-controlled boat that he demonstrated for spectators, among other things. Although Tesla was quite famous and respected in his day, he was never able to capture long-term financial success from his inventions. He died in 1943 at the age of 86.

除了他的电气发明之外，特斯拉还试验了x射线，进行了短程无线电通信的演示，并建造了一艘无线电控制的船，并向观众展示了其他一些东西。尽管特斯拉在他的时代非常有名和受人尊敬，但他从未能从他的发明中获得长期的经济成功。他于1943年去世，享年86岁。

By then, however, coal power generation’s place in power’s history had already been firmly established. The first coal-fired steam generators provided low-pressure saturated or slightly superheated steam for steam engines driving DC dynamos. Sir Charles Parsons, who built the first steam turbine generator (with a thermal efficiency of just 1.6%) in 1884, improved its efficiency two years later by introducing the first condensing turbine, which drove an AC generator.

然而，到那时，煤炭发电在电力历史上的地位已经牢固确立。第一批燃煤蒸汽发生器为驱动直流发电机的蒸汽机提供低压饱和蒸汽或微过热蒸汽。查尔斯·帕森斯爵士于1884年制造了第一台蒸汽涡轮发电机(热效率仅为1.6%)，两年后，他又推出了第一台冷凝式涡轮机，用以驱动交流发电机，从而提高了效率。

About a decade later, in 1896, American inventor Charles Curtis offered an invention of a different turbine to the General Electric Co. (GE). By 1901, GE had successfully developed a 500-kW Curtis turbine generator, which employed high-pressure steam to drive rapid rotation of a shaft-mounted disk, and by 1903, it delivered the world’s first 5-MW steam turbine to the Commonwealth Edison Co. of Chicago. Subsequent models, which received improvement boosts suggested by GE’s Dr. Sanford Moss, were used mostly as mechanical drives or as peaking units.

大约十年后的1896年，美国发明家查尔斯·柯蒂斯(Charles Curtis)向通用电气公司(General Electric Co.)提出了一项不同的涡轮机发明。到1901年，通用电气已经成功地开发了一台500千瓦的柯蒂斯涡轮发电机，它利用高压蒸汽驱动安装在轴上的圆盘的快速旋转，到1903年，它向芝加哥的联邦爱迪生公司交付了世界上第一台5兆瓦的蒸汽涡轮机。通用电气的桑福德•莫斯(Sanford Moss)博士建议改进后的后续型号，主要用作机械驱动器或调峰装置。

By the early 1900s, coal-fired power units featured outputs in the 1 MW to 10 MW range, outfitted with a steam generator, an economizer, evaporator, and a superheater section. By the 1910s, the coal-fired power plant cycle was improved even more by the introduction of turbines with steam extractions for feedwater heating and steam generators equipped with air preheaters—all which boosted net efficiency to about 15%.

到20世纪初，燃煤发电机组的输出功率在1兆瓦到10兆瓦之间，配备了蒸汽发生器、省煤器、蒸发器和过热器部分。到20世纪10年代，燃煤电厂的循环得到了更大的改善，因为引入了用于给水加热的蒸汽提取涡轮机和配备空气预热器的蒸汽发生器——所有这些都将净效率提高了15%左右。

The demonstration of pulverized coal steam generators at the Oneida Street Station in Wisconsin in 1919 vastly improved coal combustion, allowing for bigger boilers (Figure 3). In the 1920s, another technological boost came with the advent of once-through boiler applications and reheat steam power plants, along with the Benson steam generator, which was built in 1927. Reheat steam turbines became the norm in the 1930s, when unit ratings soared to a 300-MW output level. Main steam temperatures consistently increased through the 1940s, and the decade also ushered in the first attempts to clean flue gas with dust removal. The 1950s and 1960s were characterized by more technical achievements to improve efficiency—including construction of the first once-through steam generator with a supercritical main steam pressure.

1919年，威斯康星州奥奈达街车站的煤粉蒸汽发生器演示极大地改善了煤炭燃烧，允许更大的锅炉(图3)。在20世纪20年代，随着一次性锅炉应用和再热蒸汽发电厂的出现，以及1927年建造的本森蒸汽发生器，又出现了另一项技术进步。20世纪30年代，当机组额定功率飙升至300兆瓦的输出水平时，再热蒸汽轮机成为标准。主蒸汽温度在整个20世纪40年代持续上升，这十年也迎来了第一次尝试用除尘来清洁烟气。20世纪50年代和60年代的特点是在提高效率方面取得了更多的技术成就，包括建造了第一台具有超临界主蒸汽压力的一次性蒸汽发生器。

Purely pulverized. The 40-MW Lakeside Power Plant in St. Francis, Wisconsin, began operations in 1921. This image shows the steam turbines and generators at Lakeside, which was the world’s first plant to burn pulverized coal exclusively. Courtesy: WEC Energy Group 纯粉。位于威斯康星州圣弗朗西斯的40兆瓦湖畔发电厂于1921年开始运行。这张照片显示了湖边的蒸汽轮机和发电机，这是世界上第一个完全燃烧煤粉的工厂。由WEC能源集团提供

Unit ratings of 1,300 MW were reached by the 1970s. In 1972, the world’s first integrated coal gasification combined cycle power plant—a 183-MW power plant for the German generator STEAG—began operations. Mounting environmental concerns and the subsequent passage of the Clean Air Act by the Nixon administration in the 1970s, however, also spurred technical solutions such as scrubbers to mitigate sulfur dioxide emissions. The decade ended with completion of a pioneering commercial fluidized bed combustion plant built on the Georgetown University campus in Washington, D.C., in 1979.

到20世纪70年代，机组额定功率达到1300兆瓦。1972年，世界上第一个综合煤气化联合循环发电厂——为德国steag发电公司建造的183兆瓦发电厂开始运行。然而，日益严重的环境问题以及随后尼克松政府在20世纪70年代通过的《清洁空气法》(Clean Air Act)也刺激了诸如洗涤器等技术解决方案，以减少二氧化硫的排放。1979年，在华盛顿特区的乔治敦大学校园内建成了一个开创性的商业流化床燃烧工厂，这十年结束了。

The early 1980s, meanwhile, were marked by the further development of emissions control technologies, including the introduction of selective catalytic reduction systems as a secondary measure to mitigate nitrogen oxide emissions. Component performance also saw vast improvements during that period to the 21st century. Among the most recent major milestones in coal power’s history is completion of the first large-scale coal-fired power unit outfitted with carbon capture and storage technology in 2014 at Boundary Dam in Saskatchewan, Canada (see sidebar “The 2010s Marked Extraordinary Change for Power”).

与此同时，20世纪80年代初，排放控制技术得到了进一步发展，包括引入选择性催化还原系统，作为减少氮氧化物排放的二级措施。从那个时期到21世纪，组件性能也有了巨大的提高。2014年，加拿大萨斯喀彻温省的边界大坝建成了第一个配备碳捕获和储存技术的大型燃煤发电机组，这是煤电历史上最新的重大里程碑之一(参见侧栏“2010年代标志着电力的非凡变化”)。

The 2010s Marked Extraordinary Change for Power

2010年代标志着权力的非凡变化

Every one of the 13 decades that POWER magazine has been in print has been definitive for electric generation technology, policy, and business in some significant way, but few have been as transformative as the 2010s. The decade opened just as the global economy began to crawl toward recovery from a historically unprecedented downturn that had bludgeoned industrial production and sent global financial markets into chaos.

《电力》杂志出版的13年里，每一年都对发电技术、政策和商业产生了重大影响，但很少有像2010年代那样具有变革性。20世纪90年代伊始，全球经济正从一场前所未有的衰退中缓慢复苏，这场衰退重创了工业生产，并导致全球金融市场陷入混乱。

The ensuing social consciousness fueled an environmental movement, which policymakers championed. Heightened concerns about climate change—driven by a globally embraced urgency to act—propelled energy transformations across the world, resulting in a clear shift in power portfolios away from coal and toward low- or zero-carbon resources. That shift has come with concerted emphasis on flexibility. Effecting a notable cultural change, the decarbonization movement has been championed by power company shareholders and customers, and some of the biggest coal generators in the world have announced ambitions to go net-zero by mid-century.

随之而来的社会意识推动了政策制定者所倡导的环保运动。全球迫切需要采取行动推动能源转型，这加剧了对气候变化的担忧，导致电力组合明显从煤炭转向低碳或零碳资源。这种转变伴随着对灵活性的一致强调。脱碳运动带来了显著的文化变革，得到了电力公司股东和客户的支持，世界上一些最大的煤电厂已经宣布了到本世纪中叶实现净零排放的雄心。

However, the shift has also benefited from a hard economic edge. Transformations, for example, have been enabled by technology innovations that cracked open a vast new realm of natural gas supply, sent the prices of solar panels and batteries plummeting, and made small-scale decentralized generation possible, while the uptake of digitalization has soared, mainly to prioritize efficiency gains.

然而，这种转变也得益于经济上的硬优势。例如，技术创新打开了天然气供应的广阔新领域，使太阳能电池板和电池的价格暴跌，并使小规模分散式发电成为可能，而数字化的采用也大幅增加，主要是为了优先考虑效率的提高。

Disruption continues to define the power industry today. The chaotic global pandemic that jolted the world in 2020 unfolded into a precarious set of energy crises in 2021. After a cold snap prompted mass generation outages across a swath of the central U.S., most prominently in Texas, volatile energy markets and power supply vulnerabilities jacked-up turmoil in California, China, India, and across Europe and Latin America. In 2022, Russia’s occupation of Ukraine and its economic war with the West prompted a new set of energy security concerns that have remained pitted against power affordability and sustainability interests.

今天，电力行业仍然是颠覆性的。2020年震惊世界的混乱的全球大流行在2021年演变成一系列不稳定的能源危机。寒流导致美国中部大片地区(尤其是德克萨斯州)大规模停电，而动荡的能源市场和电力供应的脆弱性加剧了加州、中国、印度以及整个欧洲和拉丁美洲的动荡。2022年，俄罗斯对乌克兰的占领及其与西方的经济战争引发了一系列新的能源安全担忧，这些担忧仍然与电力的可负担性和可持续性利益相冲突。

Gas Power Takes Off

天然气电力开始腾飞

Coal power technology’s evolution was swift owing to soaring power demand and a burgeoning mining sector. The natural gas power sector, which today takes the lion’s share of both U.S. installed capacity and generation, was slower to take off. Although the essential elements of a gas turbine engine were first patented by English inventor John Barber in 1791, it took more than a century before the concepts were really put to practical use.

由于电力需求的飙升和采矿业的蓬勃发展，煤电技术的发展非常迅速。如今在美国装机容量和发电量中占据最大份额的天然气发电行业，起步较慢。尽管燃气涡轮发动机的基本要素在1791年由英国发明家约翰·巴伯(John Barber)首次获得专利，但这些概念真正投入实际应用却花了一个多世纪。

In 1903, Jens William Aegidius Elling, a Norwegian engineer, researcher, and inventor, built the first gas turbine to produce more power than was needed to run its own components. Elling’s first design used both rotary compressors and turbines to produce about 8 kW. He further refined the machine in subsequent years, and by 1912, he had developed a gas turbine system with separate turbine unit and compressor in series, a combination that is still common today.

1903年，挪威工程师、研究员和发明家延斯·威廉·埃吉迪斯·埃林(Jens William Aegidius Elling)建造了第一台燃气轮机，产生的能量超过了运行其自身组件所需的能量。埃林的第一个设计使用了旋转压缩机和涡轮机，产生大约8千瓦的电力。在随后的几年里，他进一步改进了这台机器，到1912年，他已经开发了一个燃气轮机系统，它有独立的涡轮单元和串联的压缩机，这种组合在今天仍然很常见。

Gas turbine technology continued to be enhanced by a number of innovative pioneers from various countries. In 1930, Britain’s Sir Frank Whittle patented a design for a jet engine. Gyorgy Jendrassik demonstrated Whittle’s design in Budapest, Hungary, in 1937. In 1939, a German Heinkel HE 178 aircraft flew successfully with an engine designed by Hans von Ohain that used the exhaust from a gas turbine for propulsion. The same year, Brown Boveri Co. installed the first gas turbine used for electric power generation in Neuchatel, Switzerland. Both Whittle’s and von Ohain’s first jet engines were based on centrifugal compressors.

燃气轮机技术继续得到来自不同国家的一些创新先驱的加强。1930年，英国的弗兰克·惠特尔爵士为一种喷气发动机的设计申请了专利。1937年，Gyorgy Jendrassik在匈牙利布达佩斯展示了惠特尔的设计。1939年，一架德国的Heinkel HE 178飞机成功地使用了汉斯·冯·奥海因(Hans von Ohain)设计的发动机，该发动机利用燃气轮机的废气进行推进。同年，Brown Boveri公司在瑞士纳沙泰尔安装了第一台用于发电的燃气轮机。惠特尔和冯·奥海恩的第一个喷气发动机都是基于离心压缩机的。

Innovations in aircraft technology, and engineering and manufacturing advancements during both World Wars propelled gas power technology to new heights, however. At GE, for example, engineers who participated in development of jet engines put their know-how into designing a gas turbine for industrial and utility service. Following development of a gas turbine-electric locomotive in 1948, GE installed its first commercial gas turbine for power generation—a 3.5-MW heavy-duty unit—at the Belle Isle Station owned by Oklahoma Gas & Electric in July 1949 (Figure 4). Some experts point out that because that unit used exhaust heat for feedwater heating of a steam turbine unit, it was essentially also the world’s first combined cycle power plant. That same year, Westinghouse put online a 1.3-MW unit at the River Fuel Corp. in Mississippi.

然而，两次世界大战期间飞机技术的创新以及工程和制造业的进步将燃气动力技术推向了新的高度。例如，在通用电气，参与喷气发动机开发的工程师将他们的专业知识用于设计用于工业和公用事业服务的燃气轮机。继1948年开发出燃气轮机-电力机车之后，通用电气于1949年7月在俄克拉何马天然气和电力公司拥有的贝尔岛电站安装了第一台用于发电的商用燃气轮机——一台3.5兆瓦的重型机组(图4)。一些专家指出，由于该机组使用废气为蒸汽轮机机组提供给水加热，因此它本质上也是世界上第一个联合循环发电厂。同年，西屋电气公司在密西西比州的River Fuel公司投入了一个1.3兆瓦的机组。

Trailblazer. In 1949, General Electric installed the first gas turbine built in the U.S. for the purpose of generating power at the Belle Isle Station, a 3.5-MW unit, owned by Oklahoma Gas & Electric. Courtesy: GE 开拓者。1949年，通用电气(General Electric)在贝拉岛电站(Belle Isle Station)安装了美国制造的第一台燃气轮机，用于发电，这是一个3.5兆瓦的机组，归俄克拉何马天然气和电力公司所有。礼貌:通用电气

Large heavy-duty gas turbine technology rapidly improved thereafter. In the early 1950s, firing temperatures were 1,300F (705C), by the late 1950s, they had soared to 1,500F, and eventually reached 2,000F in 1975. By 1957, a general surge in gas turbine unit sizes led to the installment of the first heat recovery steam generator (HRSG) for a gas turbine. By 1965, the first fully fired boiler combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) power plant came online, and by 1968, the first CCGT was outfitted with a HRSG. The late 1960s, meanwhile, was characterized by gas turbine suppliers starting to develop pre-designed or standard CCGT plants. GE developed the STAG (steam and gas) system, for example, Westinghouse, the PACE (Power at combined efficiency) system, and Siemens, the GUD (gas and steam) system.

此后，大型重型燃气轮机技术得到迅速发展。在20世纪50年代初，射击温度为1300华氏度(705C)，到20世纪50年代末，它们飙升至1500华氏度，并最终在1975年达到2000华氏度。到1957年，燃气轮机机组尺寸的普遍激增导致安装了第一台用于燃气轮机的热回收蒸汽发生器(HRSG)。到1965年，第一个全燃锅炉联合循环燃气轮机(CCGT)发电厂上线，到1968年，第一个CCGT配备了HRSG。与此同时，20世纪60年代末的特点是燃气轮机供应商开始开发预先设计或标准的CCGT工厂。通用电气开发了STAG(蒸汽和燃气)系统，西屋电气开发了PACE(联合效率发电)系统，西门子开发了GUD(燃气和蒸汽)系统。

The past few decades, meanwhile, have been characterized by a proliferation of large heavy-duty gas turbines that are highly flexible and efficient, and can combust multiple fuels, including high volumes of hydrogen. That development is rooted in a combustion breakthrough in the 1990s that enabled a “lean premixed combustion process.” Compared to the early days of “dry-low NOx” (DLN) technology, when turbine inlet temperatures (TIT) of 1,350C–1,400C (for the vintage F class) were common, the past two decades have ushered in “advanced class” gas turbines with TIT pushing the 1,700C mark.

与此同时，过去几十年的特点是大型重型燃气轮机的激增，这些燃气轮机具有高度的灵活性和效率，可以燃烧多种燃料，包括大量的氢。这一发展源于20世纪90年代在燃烧方面的突破，实现了“精益预混燃烧过程”。与早期“干式低氮氧化物”(DLN)技术相比，当时涡轮进口温度(TIT)为1350 - 1400摄氏度(对于老式F级)是常见的，过去二十年迎来了“先进级”燃气轮机，TIT达到了1700摄氏度。

Advanced gas turbine technology has also led to new world records in CCGT efficiency and gas turbine power output. Specifically, GE Power announced in March 2018 that the Chubu Electric Nishi-Nagoya power plant Block-1, powered by a GE 7HA gas turbine and Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corp.’s steam turbine and generator technology, had been recognized by Guinness World Records as the world’s “most efficient combined-cycle power plant,” based on achieving 63.08% gross efficiency. In August 2022, Duke Energy’s Lincoln Combustion Turbine Station, powered by a Siemens Energy SGT6-9000HL gas turbine, was certified with the official Guinness World Records title for the “most powerful simple-cycle gas power plant” with an output of 410.9 MW.

先进的燃气轮机技术也在CCGT效率和燃气轮机功率输出方面创造了新的世界纪录。具体而言，通用电气电力于2018年3月宣布，由通用电气7HA燃气轮机和东芝能源系统与解决方案公司的蒸汽轮机和发电机技术驱动的中部电气西名古屋电厂Block-1已被吉尼斯世界纪录认定为世界上“最高效的联合循环电厂”，总效率达到63.08%。2022年8月，杜克能源公司的林肯燃烧涡轮站，由西门子能源公司的SGT6-9000HL燃气轮机提供动力，以410.9兆瓦的输出功率获得了“最强大的简单循环燃气发电厂”的吉尼斯世界纪录官方认证。

Atomic Discoveries

原子的发现

Although the concept of the atom was fairly well developed, scientists had not yet figured out how to harness the energy contained in atoms when the first issue of POWER magazine was published. But 13 years later, in 1895, the accidental discovery of X-rays by Wilhelm Röntgen started a wave of experimentation in the atomic field.

虽然原子的概念已经相当发达了，但是当第一期《电力》杂志出版时，科学家们还没有弄清楚如何利用原子中所含的能量。但13年后的1895年，威廉Röntgen偶然发现了x射线，开启了原子领域的实验浪潮。

In the years that followed, radiation was discovered by Antoine Henri Becquerel, a French physicist; the Curies—Marie and Pierre—conducted additional radiation research and coined the term “radioactivity”; and Ernest Rutherford, a New Zealand-born British physicist, who many people consider the father of nuclear science, postulated the structure of the atom, proposed the laws of radioactive decay, and conducted groundbreaking research into the transmutation of elements.

在随后的几年里，法国物理学家安东尼·亨利·贝克勒尔发现了辐射;居里夫人和皮埃尔夫妇进行了进一步的辐射研究，并创造了“放射性”一词;欧内斯特·卢瑟福，出生于新西兰的英国物理学家，被许多人认为是核科学之父，他假设了原子的结构，提出了放射性衰变的规律，并对元素的嬗变进行了开创性的研究。

Many other scientists were helping advance the world’s understanding of atomic principles. Albert Einstein developed his theory of special relativity, E = mc2, where E is energy, m is mass, and c is the speed of light, in 1905. Niels Bohr published his model of the atom in 1913, which was later perfected by James Chadwick when he discovered the neutron.

许多其他科学家也在帮助推进世界对原子原理的理解。1905年，阿尔伯特·爱因斯坦提出了狭义相对论E = mc2，其中E代表能量，m代表质量，c代表光速。尼尔斯·玻尔在1913年发表了他的原子模型，后来詹姆斯·查德威克发现了中子，完善了他的模型。

Enrico Fermi, an Italian physicist, in 1934 showed that neutrons could split atoms. Two German scientists—Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassman—expanded on that knowledge in 1938 when they discovered fission, and using Einstein’s theory, the team showed that the lost mass turned to energy.

1934年，意大利物理学家恩里科·费米证明了中子可以分裂原子。1938年，两位德国科学家奥托·哈恩和弗里茨·斯特拉斯曼发现了裂变，进一步扩展了这一知识，并利用爱因斯坦的理论证明了失去的质量转化为能量。

Early Nuclear Reactors

早期核反应堆

Scientists then turned their attention to developing a self-sustaining chain reaction. To do so, a “critical mass” of uranium needed to be placed under the right conditions. Fermi, who emigrated to the U.S. in 1938 to escape fascist Italy’s racial laws, led a group of scientists at the University of Chicago in constructing the world’s first nuclear reactor.

随后，科学家们将注意力转向开发一种自我维持的连锁反应。要做到这一点，需要将“临界质量”的铀置于适当的条件下。费米于1938年为逃避意大利法西斯的种族法律移民到美国，他带领芝加哥大学的一组科学家建造了世界上第一座核反应堆。

The team’s design consisted of uranium placed in a stack of graphite to make a cube-like frame of fissionable material. The pile, known as Chicago Pile-1, was erected on the floor of a squash court beneath the University of Chicago’s athletic stadium (Figure 5). On December 2, 1942, the first self-sustaining nuclear reaction was demonstrated in Chicago Pile-1.

该团队的设计包括将铀放在一堆石墨中，形成一个立方体状的裂变材料框架。这个桩被称为芝加哥1号桩，被竖立在芝加哥大学体育馆下面的壁球场的地板上(图5)。1942年12月2日，第一次自我维持的核反应在芝加哥1号桩上进行了演示。

World’s first nuclear reactor. Chicago Pile-1 was an exponential pile. At least 29 exponential piles were constructed in 1942 under the West Stands of the University of Chicago’s Stagg Field. Source: U.S. Department of Energy 世界上第一座核反应堆。芝加哥1号堆是一个指数堆。1942年，在芝加哥大学斯塔格球场的西看台下，至少建造了29个指数桩。资料来源:美国能源部

But the U.S. was a year into World War II at the time, and most of the atomic research being done then was focused on developing weapons technology. It was not until after the war that the U.S. government began encouraging the development of nuclear energy for peaceful civilian purposes. The first reactor to produce electricity from nuclear energy was Experimental Breeder Reactor I, on December 20, 1951, in Idaho.

但当时美国已经进入第二次世界大战一年，当时进行的大部分原子研究都集中在开发武器技术上。直到战争结束后，美国政府才开始鼓励为和平民用目的发展核能。第一个利用核能发电的反应堆是1951年12月20日在爱达荷州建造的一号实验增殖反应堆。

The Soviet Union had a burgeoning nuclear power program at the time too. Its scientists modified an existing graphite-moderated channel-type plutonium production reactor for heat and electricity generation. In June 1954, that unit, located in Obninsk, began generating electricity. A few years later, on December 18, 1957, the first commercial U.S. nuclear power plant—Shippingport Atomic Power Station, a light-water reactor with a 60-MW capacity—was synchronized to the power grid in Pennsylvania.

苏联当时也有一个蓬勃发展的核电项目。它的科学家改良了现有的石墨慢化通道型钚生产反应堆，用于热和发电。1954年6月，这个位于奥布宁斯克的装置开始发电。几年后，1957年12月18日，美国第一座商业核电站——shippingport Atomic power Station，一座容量为60兆瓦的轻水反应堆——与宾夕法尼亚州的电网同步。

The U.S. and Soviet Union weren’t the only countries building nuclear plants, however. The UK, Germany, Japan, France, and several others were jumping on the bandwagon too. The industry grew rapidly during the 1960s and 1970s. Nuclear construction projects were on drawing boards across the U.S., with 41 new units ordered in 1973 alone. But slower electricity demand growth, construction delays, cost overruns, and complicated regulatory requirements, put an end to the heyday in the mid-1970s. Nearly half of all planned U.S. projects ended up being canceled. Nonetheless, by 1991 the U.S. had twice as many operating commercial reactors—112 units—as any other country in the world.

然而，美国和苏联并不是唯一建造核电站的国家。英国、德国、日本、法国和其他几个国家也加入了这一行列。该行业在20世纪60年代和70年代迅速发展。美国各地的核电建设项目都在规划阶段，仅1973年就订购了41座新机组。但电力需求增长放缓、建设延误、成本超支以及复杂的监管要求，终结了20世纪70年代中期的全盛时期。美国近一半计划中的项目最终被取消。尽管如此，到1991年，美国运行的商业反应堆数量是世界上任何其他国家的两倍，达到112座。

Nuclear power’s history is tainted by three major accidents. The first was the partial meltdown of Three Mile Island Unit 2 on March 28, 1979. A combination of equipment malfunctions, design-related problems, and worker errors led to the meltdown. The second major accident occurred on April 26, 1986. That event was triggered by a sudden surge of power during a reactor systems test on Unit 4 at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in Ukraine, in the former Soviet Union. The accident and a subsequent fire released massive amounts of radioactive material into the environment.

核电的历史受到三起重大事故的污染。第一次是1979年3月28日三里岛核电站2号机组的部分熔毁。设备故障、设计相关问题和工作人员失误共同导致了熔毁。第二次重大事故发生在1986年4月26日。这一事件是由前苏联乌克兰切尔诺贝利核电站4号机组的反应堆系统测试期间突然发生的电力激增引发的。事故和随后的火灾向环境中释放了大量的放射性物质。

The most-recent major accident occurred following a 9.0-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Japan on March 11, 2011. The quake caused the Fukushima Daiichi station to lose all off-site power. Backup systems worked, but 40 minutes after the quake, a 14-meter-high tsunami struck the area, knocking some of them out. Three reactors eventually overheated—melting their cores to some degree—then hydrogen explosions spread radioactive contamination throughout the area.

最近的一次重大事故发生在2011年3月11日日本沿海发生的9.0级地震之后。地震导致福岛第一核电站失去了所有场外电力。备用系统正常工作，但地震发生40分钟后，一场14米高的海啸袭击了该地区，摧毁了一些人。三个反应堆最终过热，堆芯在一定程度上融化，然后氢爆炸将放射性污染扩散到整个地区。

The consequences of accidents have played a role in decisions to phase out or cut back reliance on nuclear power in some countries including Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, and Spain. Nonetheless, China, Russia, India, the United Arab Emirates, the U.S., and others continue to build new units, incorporating a lot of modern power plant technology (see sidebar “The Rise of IIoT”).

在一些国家，包括比利时、德国、瑞士和西班牙，事故的后果在决定逐步淘汰或减少对核能的依赖方面发挥了作用。尽管如此，中国、俄罗斯、印度、阿联酋、美国和其他国家仍在继续建造新的机组，融合了许多现代电厂技术(参见侧栏“工业物联网的兴起”)。

The Rise of IIoT

工业物联网的兴起

Power plant automation was already well-advanced by 2009, when more facilities shed boiler-turbine generator boards and vertical panels populated with indicators and strip chart recorders, and adopted open systems using industry-standard hardware and software. By then, companies were already beginning to grasp the value of digital modeling and virtual simulation, as well as sensors and wireless technologies.

到2009年，发电厂的自动化已经取得了很大的进步，更多的发电厂抛弃了锅炉涡轮发电机板和装有指示器和条形图记录器的垂直面板，采用了使用工业标准硬件和软件的开放系统。到那时，公司已经开始掌握数字建模和虚拟仿真的价值，以及传感器和无线技术。

The definitive shift arrived around 2012 with the introduction of the concept of the “industrial internet of things” (IIoT)—a term GE claims it coined—which described the connection between machines, advanced analytics, and the people who use them. According to GE, IIoT is “the network of a multitude of industrial devices connected by communications technologies that results in systems that can monitor, collect, exchange, analyze, and deliver valuable new insights like never before. These insights can then help drive smarter, faster business decisions for industrial companies.”

2012年左右，随着“工业物联网”(IIoT)概念的引入，最终的转变到来了——通用电气声称这是它创造的一个术语——它描述了机器、高级分析和使用它们的人之间的联系。根据通用电气的说法，工业物联网是“通过通信技术连接的众多工业设备的网络，从而形成可以监控、收集、交换、分析和提供前所未有的有价值的新见解的系统。”这些见解可以帮助工业企业做出更明智、更快速的商业决策。”

In the power sector, IIoT morphed into a multi-billion-dollar industry, and it has since enabled predictive analytics to forecast and detect component issues; it provides real-time production data (Big Data), which has opened up a realm of possibilities; and enabled software solutions—all of which have boosted efficiency, productivity, and performance. Over the last decade, several companies have rolled out comprehensive power plant–oriented IIoT platforms, such as GE’s Predix and Siemens’ MindSphere, and driven the rapid development of technologies that benefit from them, such as fourth-generation sensors, Big Data, edge intelligence, as well as augmented and virtual reality, and artificial intelligence and machine learning.

在电力行业，工业物联网已经发展成为一个价值数十亿美元的产业，并且已经实现了预测分析来预测和检测组件问题;它提供实时生产数据(大数据)，这开辟了一个可能性的领域;以及启用的软件解决方案——所有这些都提高了效率、生产力和性能。在过去的十年里，几家公司推出了全面的面向发电厂的工业物联网平台，如通用电气的Predix和西门子的MindSphere，并推动了受益于这些平台的技术的快速发展，如第四代传感器、大数据、边缘智能、增强现实和虚拟现实、人工智能和机器学习。

Separately, these and other digital possibilities have opened up a vast intelligence realm for other aspects of the power sector, including for grid—such as for forecasting, grid stability, outage response, distributed energy resource orchestration, communications, and mobility. Components manufacturing, too, is digitally evolving, with advancements in 3D printing, development of new materials, and process intensification.

另外，这些和其他数字可能性已经为电力部门的其他方面(包括电网)开辟了广阔的智能领域，例如预测、电网稳定性、停电响应、分布式能源编排、通信和移动性。随着3D打印技术的进步、新材料的开发和工艺的强化，零部件制造业也在数字化发展。

Renewables: The World’s Oldest and Newest Energy Sources

可再生能源:世界上最古老和最新的能源

While humans have been harnessing energy from the sun, wind, and water for thousands of years, technology has changed significantly over the course of history, and these ancient energy types have developed into state-of-the-art innovative power generation sources.

虽然人类利用太阳能、风能和水能已有数千年的历史，但随着历史的发展，技术也发生了重大变化，这些古老的能源类型已经发展成为最先进的创新发电来源。

Chasing Water. What became modern renewable energy generation got its start in the late 1800s, around the time that POWER launched. Hydropower was first to transition to a commercial electricity generation source, and it advanced very quickly. In 1880, Michigan’s Grand Rapids Electric Light and Power Co. generated DC electricity using hydropower at the Wolverine Chair Co. A belt-driven dynamo powered by a water turbine at the factory lit 16 arc street lamps.

追逐的水。现代可再生能源发电始于19世纪末，大约在POWER推出的时候。水电是第一个转变为商业发电的能源，而且发展非常迅速。1880年，密歇根州的大急流城电灯和电力公司利用金刚狼椅子公司的水力发电产生直流电。工厂里一台由水轮机驱动的皮带发电机点亮了16盏弧形路灯。

Just two years later, the world’s first central DC hydroelectric station powered a paper mill in Appleton, Wisconsin. By 1886, there were 40 to 50 hydroelectric plants operating in the U.S. and Canada alone, and by 1888, roughly 200 electric companies relied on hydropower for at least some of their electricity generation (see sidebar “The Evolution of Power Business Models”). In 1889, the nation’s first AC hydroelectric plant came online, the Willamette Falls Station in Oregon City, Oregon.

仅仅两年后，世界上第一个中央直流水电站为威斯康星州阿普尔顿的一家造纸厂供电。到1886年，仅在美国和加拿大就有40到50座水力发电厂在运行，到1888年，大约有200家电力公司至少部分依靠水力发电(参见侧栏“电力商业模式的演变”)。1889年，美国第一个交流水力发电厂——位于俄勒冈州俄勒冈市的威拉米特瀑布电站投产。

The Evolution of Power Business Models

电力商业模式的演变

The birth of the modern electric utility began when Thomas Edison invented the practical lightbulb in 1878, and, to spur demand for the novel invention, developed an entire power system that generated and distributed electricity. While the concept caught on in several cities in the early years, owing to exorbitant costs, power companies rarely owned several power plants.

现代电力事业的诞生始于1878年托马斯·爱迪生发明了实用的灯泡，为了刺激对这项新发明的需求，他开发了一套完整的发电和配电系统。虽然这一概念在早期的几个城市流行起来，但由于成本过高，电力公司很少拥有几家发电厂。

Samuel Insull, who began his role as president at Chicago Edison in 1892, is credited with first exploiting load factor, not only finding power customers for off-peak times, but leveraging technology including larger generation systems and alternating current to produce and transmit power more cheaply. Crucially, he is also said to have pioneered consolidation; he acquired 20 small utilities by 1907 to give birth to a natural monopoly—Commonwealth Edison.

塞缪尔·因萨尔于1892年开始担任芝加哥爱迪生公司的总裁，他被认为是第一个利用负载系数的人，不仅在非高峰时期找到了电力客户，而且利用了包括大型发电系统和交流电在内的技术，以更低的成本生产和传输电力。最重要的是，据说他也是行业整合的先驱;到1907年，他收购了20家小型公用事业公司，自然垄断了联邦爱迪生公司。

The model was widely emulated, and for decades, scale economies associated with large centralized generation technologies encouraged vertical integration to drive down power costs, encourage universal access, and provide reliability. To enforce the responsibilities and rights of these investor-owned utilities (IOUs) and their customers, however, this approach also spurred more government oversight and regulation. It also gave rise to both municipal ownership, and later, as a New Deal measure, public power to enable rural electrification.

这种模式被广泛效仿，几十年来，与大型集中式发电技术相关的规模经济鼓励了垂直整合，从而降低了电力成本，鼓励了普遍接入，并提供了可靠性。然而，为了加强这些投资者拥有的公用事业(iou)及其客户的责任和权利，这种方法也刺激了更多的政府监督和监管。它还产生了市政所有权，后来，作为新政措施，公共权力使农村电气化成为可能。

Business models began to shift more distinctively starting in the late 1970s, as environmental policy, the oil shocks, and initiatives to open the airline and trucking industries to competition disrupted the status quo. The evolution that happened in the last 40 years, which has left an enduring legacy, is often categorized into two big buckets: the introduction of competition, and reforming the way monopoly utilities operate. A key step to initiating reforms in the U.S. stemmed from passage of the Public Utilities Regulatory Policies Act (PURPA) of 1978, which essentially created opportunities for smaller generators to get into the game.

从20世纪70年代末开始，商业模式开始发生更明显的转变，因为环境政策、石油危机以及向航空和卡车行业开放竞争的举措打破了现状。过去40年发生的变革留下了持久的遗产，人们通常将其分为两大类:引入竞争，以及改革垄断公用事业的运营方式。美国启动改革的关键一步源于1978年《公用事业监管政策法案》(Public Utilities Regulatory Policies Act, PURPA)的通过，该法案实质上为小型发电企业进入这一行业创造了机会。

The final, but just as significant, historical upheaval was energy deregulation. In the 1990s, holding competition as the most effective driver of low power costs, several states also moved to end monopoly protections for retail sales—though after California’s high-profile energy crisis in 2000 and 2001, many scaled back their plans and even re-regulated their retail sectors. Deregulation had the important role of giving rise to new retail companies, whose business models were exclusively focused on delivery of power to the customer.

最后，但同样重要的历史剧变是能源放松管制。在20世纪90年代，竞争是降低电力成本的最有效的驱动因素，一些州也开始结束对零售销售的垄断保护——尽管在2000年和2001年加州高调的能源危机之后，许多州缩减了他们的计划，甚至重新监管他们的零售部门。放松管制在催生新零售公司方面发挥了重要作用，这些公司的商业模式完全专注于向客户输送电力。

If and how these models thrive, however, is questionable. Decarbonization, decentralization, and digitalization—as well as the recent impact from the COVID-19 pandemic—have slackened or prompted a decline in power demand. At the same time, traditional regulatory approaches, which have been predicated on growth, must grapple with an increasingly complex industry landscape. The past decades have ushered in two-way flows of electricity, more stringent environmental policies, and state goals. Regulators are challenged with ensuring power systems are operating efficiently, complying with environmental goals, remain reliable, and address equity issues for low-income customers.

然而，这些模式能否以及如何茁壮成长，还是个问题。脱碳、去中心化和数字化，以及最近COVID-19大流行的影响，已经减缓或促使电力需求下降。与此同时，以增长为基础的传统监管方式必须应对日益复杂的行业格局。在过去的几十年里，电力的双向流动、更严格的环境政策和国家目标已经出现。监管机构面临的挑战是确保电力系统高效运行，符合环境目标，保持可靠性，并解决低收入客户的公平问题。

Internationally, Switzerland was at the forefront of pumped storage, opening the world’s first such plant in 1909. Pumped storage wasn’t integrated into the U.S. energy mix until 1930 when Connecticut Electric Light and Power Co. erected a pumped storage plant in New Milford, Connecticut.

在国际上，瑞士处于抽水蓄能的前沿，于1909年开设了世界上第一个抽水蓄能工厂。抽水蓄能直到1930年康涅狄格电灯和电力公司在康涅狄格的新米尔福德建立抽水蓄能电站后才被纳入美国的能源结构。

Blowing in the Wind. At about the same time that hydropower was gaining popularity, inventors were also figuring out how to use the windmills of the past to generate electricity for the future. In 1888, Charles Brush, an inventor in Ohio, constructed a 60-foot wind turbine in his backyard (Figure 6). The windmill’s wheel was 56 feet in diameter and had 144 blades. A shaft inside the tower turned pulleys and belts, which spun a 12-kW dynamo that was connected to batteries in Brush’s basement.

在风中飘荡。大约在水力发电越来越受欢迎的同时，发明家们也在研究如何利用过去的风车为未来发电。1888年，俄亥俄州的发明家Charles Brush在他的后院建造了一个60英尺高的风力涡轮机(图6)。风车的轮子直径56英尺，有144片叶片。塔内的一个轴转动滑轮和皮带，带动一台12千瓦的发电机，该发电机与Brush地下室的电池相连。

Birth of the wind turbine. In 1888, Charles Brush, an inventor in Ohio, constructed a 60-foot wind turbine capable of generating electricity in his backyard. Source: Wikimedia Commons 风力涡轮机的诞生。1888年，俄亥俄州的发明家查尔斯·布拉什(Charles Brush)在自家后院建造了一座60英尺高的风力涡轮机，能够发电。来源:维基共享资源

Wind-powered turbines slowly and with little fanfare spread throughout the world. The American Midwest, where the turbines were used to power irrigation pumps, saw numerous installations. In 1941, the world saw the first 1.25-MW turbine connected to the grid on a hill in Castleton, Vermont, called Grandpa’s Knob.

风力涡轮机慢慢地、悄无声息地传遍了世界。在美国中西部，涡轮机被用来为灌溉泵提供动力，那里安装了许多涡轮机。1941年，世界上第一个1.25兆瓦的涡轮机在佛蒙特州卡斯尔顿的一个小山上并网，这个小山上被称为爷爷的旋钮。

Interest in wind power was renewed by the oil crisis of the 1970s, which spurred research and development. Wind power in the U.S. got a policy boost when President Jimmy Carter signed the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act of 1978, which required companies to buy a certain amount of electricity from renewable energy sources, including wind.

20世纪70年代的石油危机刺激了风能的研究和开发，人们对风能的兴趣重新燃起。美国总统吉米·卡特(Jimmy Carter)在1978年签署了《公用事业监管政策法案》(Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act)，要求企业从包括风能在内的可再生能源购买一定数量的电力，从而推动了美国的风能发展。

By the 1980s, the first utility-scale wind farms began popping up in California. Europe has been the leader in offshore wind, with the first offshore wind farm installed in 1991 in Denmark. According to Wind Europe, Europe had 236 GW of installed wind capacity at the end of 2021, a significant increase from the 12.6 GW of capacity that was grid-connected five years earlier.

到了20世纪80年代，第一批公用事业规模的风力发电场开始在加州出现。欧洲一直是海上风电的领导者，1991年在丹麦建立了第一个海上风电场。根据欧洲风能公司的数据，到2021年底，欧洲的风电装机容量为236吉瓦，比五年前并网的12.6吉瓦的装机容量有了显着增长。

In late 2016, the first offshore wind farm in the U.S., a five-turbine, 30-MW project, began operation in the waters off of Block Island, Rhode Island. Yet, by 2022, only one additional offshore wind project had been added to the U.S. grid—the two-turbine Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind pilot project with a generating capacity of 12 MW. However, onshore wind installations have fared much better. By mid-2022, more than 139 GW of onshore wind capacity was grid-connected in the U.S., according to American Clean Power, a renewable energy advocacy group.

2016年底，美国第一个海上风电场，一个5台涡轮机，30兆瓦的项目，在罗德岛布洛克岛附近的水域开始运行。然而，到2022年，只有一个额外的海上风电项目加入了美国电网——两个涡轮机的弗吉尼亚海岸海上风电试点项目，发电量为12兆瓦。然而，陆上风力发电的情况要好得多。根据可再生能源倡导组织美国清洁能源(American Clean Power)的数据，到2022年年中，美国陆上风电装机容量将超过139吉瓦并网。

Let the Sunshine In. Compared to other commercially available renewable energy sources, solar power is in its infancy, though the path that led to its commercial use began almost 200 years ago. In 1839, French scientist Edmond Becquerel discovered the photovoltaic (PV) effect by experimenting with an electrolytic cell made of two metal electrodes in a conducting solution. Becquerel found that electricity generation increased when it was exposed to light.

让阳光照进来。与其他商业上可用的可再生能源相比，太阳能还处于起步阶段，尽管其商业应用的道路始于近200年前。1839年，法国科学家Edmond Becquerel在导电溶液中对由两个金属电极制成的电解电池进行实验，发现了光伏(PV)效应。贝克勒尔发现，当它暴露在光线下时，发电量会增加。

More than three decades later, an English electrical engineer named Willoughby Smith discovered the photoconductivity of selenium. By 1882 the first solar cell was created by New York inventor Charles Fritts, who coated selenium with a layer of gold to develop a cell with an energy conversion rate of just 1–2%.

三十多年后，一位名叫威洛比·史密斯的英国电气工程师发现了硒的光导电性。1882年，纽约发明家查尔斯·弗里茨(Charles Fritts)发明了第一块太阳能电池，他在硒上涂上一层金，开发出能量转化率仅为1-2%的电池。

It wasn’t until the 1950s, however, that silicon solar cells were produced commercially. Physicists at Bell Laboratories determined silicon to be more efficient than selenium. The cell created by Bell Labs was “the first solar cell capable of converting enough of the sun’s energy into power to run everyday electrical equipment,” according to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).

然而，直到20世纪50年代，硅太阳能电池才开始商业化生产。贝尔实验室的物理学家确定硅比硒更有效。根据美国能源部(DOE)的说法，贝尔实验室发明的这种电池是“第一个能够将足够的太阳能转化为电能以运行日常电气设备的太阳能电池”。

By the 1970s, the efficiency of solar cells had increased, and they began to be used to power navigation warning lights and horns on many offshore gas and oil rigs, lighthouses, and railroad crossing signals. Domestic solar applications began to be viewed as sensible alternatives in remote locations where grid-connected options were not affordable.

到20世纪70年代，太阳能电池的效率提高了，它们开始被用于为许多海上天然气和石油钻井平台上的导航警示灯和喇叭、灯塔和铁路交叉信号供电。在偏远地区，家用太阳能开始被视为明智的选择，因为这些地区无法负担并网的选择。

The 1980s saw significant progress in the development of more-efficient, more-powerful solar projects. In 1982, the first PV megawatt-scale power station, developed by ARCO Solar, came online in Hesperia, California. Also in 1982, the DOE began operating Solar One, a 10-MW central-receiver demonstration project, the first project to prove the feasibility of power tower technology. Then, in 1992, researchers at the University of South Florida developed a 15.9%-efficient thin-film PV cell, the first to break the 15% efficiency barrier. By the mid-2000s, residential solar power systems were available for sale in home improvement stores.

20世纪80年代，在开发更高效、更强大的太阳能项目方面取得了重大进展。1982年，由ARCO太阳能公司开发的首个兆瓦级光伏电站在加州赫斯佩里亚上线。同样在1982年，美国能源部开始运营Solar One，这是一个10兆瓦的中央接收器示范项目，是第一个证明电力塔技术可行性的项目。然后，在1992年，南佛罗里达大学的研究人员开发了一种效率为15.9%的薄膜光伏电池，这是第一个突破15%效率障碍的电池。到2000年代中期，家用太阳能发电系统已经可以在家装店买到。

In 2016, solar power from utility-scale facilities accounted for less than 0.9% of U.S. electricity generation. However, the solar industry has gained significant momentum since then. According to the Solar Energy Industries Association, there was more than 126 GW of solar power capacity installed in the U.S. at the end of March 2022, and the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported that almost 4% of U.S. electricity came from solar energy in 2021. (For more details on the history of all power generation types, see supplements associated with this issue at powermag.com.) 

2016年，来自公用事业规模设施的太阳能发电量占美国发电量的比例不到0.9%。然而，自那以后，太阳能产业获得了显著的发展势头。根据太阳能产业协会的数据，截至2022年3月底，美国太阳能装机容量超过126吉瓦，美国能源情报署报告称，2021年美国近4%的电力来自太阳能。(有关所有发电类型历史的更多详细信息，请参阅powermag.com与此问题相关的补充资料。)

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前言：

环境能源和可耻寻发展，实际上最终解决的是能源的利用率问题。通过限制或者控制能源源头的碳排放量来控制降碳。

那么问题来了，在古代，电是怎么来的呢？整个发电工业又是如何演变的呢？如果我们想要降碳，那么未来的电力和动力系统，又是怎么样的呢？我们已经离不开电力的基础设施，现代社会的生活也无法离开电力供应。带着这样那样的疑问，开始本次旅行。

History of Power: The Evolution of the Electric Generation Industry

电力的历史:发电工业的演变

POWER magazine was launched in 1882, just as the world was beginning to grasp the implications of a new, versatile form of energy: electricity. During its 140-year history, the magazine’s pages have reflected the fast-changing evolution of the technologies and markets that characterize the world’s power sector. These are some of the events that have shaped both the history of power and the history of POWER.

《电力》杂志创刊于1882年，当时世界刚刚开始认识到一种新的、多用途的能源:电力。在其140年的历史中，该杂志的页面反映了世界电力行业技术和市场快速变化的演变。这些事件塑造了权力的历史和权力的历史。

The history of power generation is long and convoluted, marked by myriad technological milestones, conceptual and technical, from hundreds of contributors. Many accounts begin power’s story at the demonstration of electric conduction by Englishman Stephen Gray, which led to the 1740 invention of glass friction generators in Leyden, Germany. That development is said to have inspired Benjamin Franklin’s famous experiments, as well as the invention of the battery by Italy’s Alessandro Volta in 1800, Humphry Davy’s first effective “arc lamp” in 1808, and in 1820, Hans Christian Oersted’s demonstration of the relationship between electricity and magnetism. In 1820, in arguably the most pivotal contribution to modern power systems, Michael Faraday and Joseph Henry invented a primitive electric motor, and in 1831, documented that an electric current can be produced in a wire moving near a magnet—demonstrating the principle of the generator.

发电的历史是漫长而曲折的，标志着无数的技术里程碑，概念和技术，来自数百个贡献者。许多记载都是从英国人斯蒂芬·格雷(Stephen Gray)对导电的演示开始的，这导致了1740年在德国莱顿(Leyden)发明玻璃摩擦发电机。据说，这一发展启发了本杰明·富兰克林的著名实验，以及1800年意大利的亚历山德罗·伏塔发明的电池，1808年汉弗莱·戴维发明的第一盏有效的“弧光灯”，以及1820年汉斯·克里斯蒂安·奥斯特对电和磁之间关系的论证。1820年，迈克尔·法拉第(Michael Faraday)和约瑟夫·亨利(Joseph Henry)发明了一种原始的电动机，这可以说是对现代电力系统最关键的贡献。1831年，他们记录了在靠近磁铁的导线中可以产生电流——这证明了发电机的原理。

Invention of the first rudimentary dynamo is credited to Frenchman Hippolyte Pixii in 1832. Antonio Pacinotti improved it to provide continuous direct-current (DC) power by 1860. In 1867, Werner von Siemens, Charles Wheatstone, and S.A. Varley nearly simultaneously devised the “self-exciting dynamo-electric generator.” Perhaps the most important improvement then arrived in 1870, when a Belgian inventor, Zenobe Gramme, devised a dynamo that produced a steady DC source well-suited to powering motors—a discovery that generated a burst of enthusiasm about electricity’s potential to light and power the world.

第一台基本的发电机是1832年法国人希波利特·皮xii发明的。到1860年，安东尼奥·帕西诺蒂对其进行了改进，提供了连续的直流电。1867年，Werner von Siemens, Charles Wheatstone和S.A. Varley几乎同时设计了“自激发电机”。也许最重要的进步发生在1870年，比利时发明家泽诺贝·格拉姆发明了一种发电机，可以产生稳定的直流电源，非常适合为电机提供动力。这一发现引发了人们对电力在照明和为世界供电方面的潜力的热情。

By 1877—as the streets of many cities across the world were being lit up by arc lighting (but not ordinary rooms because arc lights were still blindingly bright)—Ohio-based Charles F. Brush had developed and begun selling the most reliable dynamo design to that point, and a host of forward thinkers were actively exploring the promise of large-scale electricity distribution. Eventually, Thomas Edison invented a less powerful incandescent lamp in 1879, and in September 1882—only a month before the inaugural issue of POWER magazine was published—he established a central generating station at Pearl Street (Figure 1) in lower Manhattan.

到1877年，当世界上许多城市的街道都被电弧照明照亮时(但不是普通的房间，因为电弧灯仍然亮得刺眼)，俄亥俄州的查尔斯·f·布拉什已经开发并开始销售最可靠的发电机设计，一群前瞻性的思想家正在积极探索大规模配电的前景。最终，托马斯·爱迪生在1879年发明了功率较小的白炽灯，并在1882年9月——仅在《POWER》杂志创刊号的一个月前——他在曼哈顿下城的珍珠街(图1)建立了一个中央发电站。

Pearl Street Station. Thomas Edison in September 1882 achieved his vision of a full-scale central power station with a system of conductors to distribute electricity to end-users in the high-profile business district in New York City. Source: U.S. Department of Energy 珍珠街站。1882年9月，托马斯·爱迪生(Thomas Edison)实现了他的设想:在纽约市备受瞩目的商业区，建造一座规模全面的中央发电站，用导线系统将电力输送给最终用户。资料来源:美国能源部

A History Rooted in Coal

根植于煤炭的历史

Advances in alternating-current (AC) technology opened up new realms for power generation (see sidebar “Tesla and the War of the Currents”). Hydropower, for example, marked several milestones between 1890 and 1900 in Oregon, Colorado, Croatia (where the first complete multiphase AC system was demonstrated in 1895), at Niagara Falls, and in Japan.

交流(AC)技术的进步为发电开辟了新的领域(参见侧栏“特斯拉和电流之战”)。例如，1890年至1900年间，水力发电在俄勒冈州、科罗拉多州、克罗地亚(1895年在那里展示了第一个完整的多相交流系统)、尼亚加拉瀑布和日本标志着几个里程碑。

Tesla and the War of the Currents

特斯拉和潮流之战

Today, most people recognize the name Tesla as a company that makes electric vehicles, but the real genius behind the name is not Elon Musk—it’s the Serbian-American engineer and physicist Nikola Tesla. Tesla, for all intents and purposes, was the man who pioneered today’s modern alternating-current (AC) electricity supply system.

今天，大多数人认为特斯拉是一家制造电动汽车的公司，但这个名字背后真正的天才并不是埃隆·马斯克，而是塞尔维亚裔美国工程师和物理学家尼古拉·特斯拉。无论从哪个角度来看，特斯拉都是当今现代交流供电系统的先驱。

Tesla was born in 1856 in Smiljan, Croatia, which was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the time. He studied math and physics at the Technical University of Graz in Austria, and also studied philosophy for a time at the University of Prague in what is now the Czech Republic. In 1882, he moved to Paris and got a job repairing direct-current (DC) power plants with the Continental Edison Co. Two years later, he immigrated to the U.S., where he became a naturalized citizen in 1889.

特斯拉于1856年出生在当时属于奥匈帝国的克罗地亚的斯米利扬。他在奥地利格拉茨技术大学学习数学和物理，并在布拉格大学(现捷克共和国)学习了一段时间的哲学。1882年，他移居巴黎，在大陆爱迪生公司找到了一份修理直流电电厂的工作。两年后，他移民到美国，并于1889年加入美国国籍。

Upon arrival in the U.S., Tesla found a job working for Thomas Edison in New York City, which he did for about a year. Edison was reportedly impressed by Tesla’s skill and work ethic, but the two men were much different in their methods and temperament. Tesla solved many problems through visionary revelations; whereas, Edison relied more on practical experiments and trial-and-error. Furthermore, Tesla believed strongly that AC electrical systems were more practical for large-scale power delivery; whereas, Edison championed DC systems in what has since come to be known as the “War of the Currents.”

抵达美国后，特斯拉在纽约为托马斯·爱迪生(Thomas Edison)找到了一份工作，他在那里工作了大约一年。据报道，爱迪生对特斯拉的技能和职业道德印象深刻，但这两个人在方法和气质上有很大不同。特斯拉通过有远见的启示解决了许多问题;而爱迪生更依赖于实际实验和试错法。此外，特斯拉坚信交流电力系统更适合大规模电力输送;然而，爱迪生在后来被称为“电流之战”的直流系统中支持直流系统。

Tesla left Edison’s company following a payment dispute over one of Tesla’s dynamo improvements. After his departure, Tesla struggled for a time to find funding to start his own business. When he finally did get his company going, Tesla moved quickly, and over the span of about two years he was granted more than 30 patents for his inventions, which included a whole polyphase system of AC dynamos, transformers, and motors.

特斯拉离开了爱迪生的公司，因为特斯拉的一项发电机改进引起了付款纠纷。在他离开后，特斯拉有一段时间很难找到创业的资金。当他的公司终于开始运转时，特斯拉行动迅速，在大约两年的时间里，他的发明获得了30多项专利，其中包括一整套由交流发电机、变压器和电动机组成的多相系统。

Word of Tesla’s innovative ideas spread, leading to an invitation for him to speak before the American Institute of Electrical Engineers. It was here that Tesla caught the eye of George Westinghouse, another AC power pioneer. Soon thereafter, Westinghouse bought the rights to Tesla’s patents and momentum for AC systems picked up.

特斯拉的创新理念传开了，他被邀请在美国电气工程师协会发表演讲。正是在这里，特斯拉引起了另一位交流电先驱乔治·威斯汀豪斯的注意。此后不久，西屋公司购买了特斯拉的专利权，交流电系统的发展势头开始回升。

Perhaps the most important battle in the War of the Currents occurred in 1893 during the World’s Columbian Exposition, the official name of the World’s Fair that year, held in Chicago, Illinois. Westinghouse’s company won the bid over Edison’s company to power the fair with electricity, and it did so with Tesla’s polyphase system.

也许在“海流之战”中最重要的战役发生在1893年在伊利诺斯州芝加哥市举行的世界哥伦比亚博览会期间，这是当年世界博览会的官方名称。威斯汀豪斯的公司击败了爱迪生的公司，赢得了为博览会提供电力的竞标，而它使用的是特斯拉的多相系统。

Among the exhibits (Figure 2) displayed at the fair were a switchboard, polyphase generators, step-up transformers, transmission lines, step-down transformers, industrial-sized induction motors and synchronous motors, rotary DC converters, meters, and other auxiliary devices. The demonstration allowed the public to see what an AC power system could look like and what it would be capable of doing. The fact that power could be transmitted over long distances, and utilized even to supply DC systems, opened many peoples’ eyes to the benefits it could provide and spurred movement toward a nationwide AC-powered grid.

在博览会上展出的展品(图2)包括配电盘、多相发电机、升压变压器、输电线路、降压变压器、工业规模的感应电动机和同步电动机、旋转直流变换器、仪表和其他辅助设备。这次演示让公众看到了交流电力系统的样子，以及它能做什么。电力可以远距离传输，甚至可以用来供应直流系统，这一事实使许多人看到了它所能提供的好处，并推动了全国交流电网的发展。

A Display Filled with Innovation. Westinghouse Electric Corp. exhibit of electric motors built on Nikola Tesla’s patent, and demonstrations of how they function, at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition (World’s Fair) in Chicago, Illinois. Also exhibited (front, center) are early Tesla Coils and parts from his high-frequency alternator. Courtesy: Detre Library & Archives, Heinz History Center 一个充满创新的展示。西屋电气公司在1893年伊利诺斯州芝加哥市举行的哥伦比亚世界博览会上展示了基于尼古拉·特斯拉专利制造的电动机，并演示了它们的工作原理。同时展出的(前，中)是早期的特斯拉线圈和零件，从他的高频交流发电机。提供:德雷图书馆和档案馆，亨氏历史中心

In addition to his electrical inventions, Tesla also experimented with X-rays, gave short-range demonstrations of radio communication, and built a radio-controlled boat that he demonstrated for spectators, among other things. Although Tesla was quite famous and respected in his day, he was never able to capture long-term financial success from his inventions. He died in 1943 at the age of 86.

除了他的电气发明之外，特斯拉还试验了x射线，进行了短程无线电通信的演示，并建造了一艘无线电控制的船，并向观众展示了其他一些东西。尽管特斯拉在他的时代非常有名和受人尊敬，但他从未能从他的发明中获得长期的经济成功。他于1943年去世，享年86岁。

By then, however, coal power generation’s place in power’s history had already been firmly established. The first coal-fired steam generators provided low-pressure saturated or slightly superheated steam for steam engines driving DC dynamos. Sir Charles Parsons, who built the first steam turbine generator (with a thermal efficiency of just 1.6%) in 1884, improved its efficiency two years later by introducing the first condensing turbine, which drove an AC generator.

然而，到那时，煤炭发电在电力历史上的地位已经牢固确立。第一批燃煤蒸汽发生器为驱动直流发电机的蒸汽机提供低压饱和蒸汽或微过热蒸汽。查尔斯·帕森斯爵士于1884年制造了第一台蒸汽涡轮发电机(热效率仅为1.6%)，两年后，他又推出了第一台冷凝式涡轮机，用以驱动交流发电机，从而提高了效率。

About a decade later, in 1896, American inventor Charles Curtis offered an invention of a different turbine to the General Electric Co. (GE). By 1901, GE had successfully developed a 500-kW Curtis turbine generator, which employed high-pressure steam to drive rapid rotation of a shaft-mounted disk, and by 1903, it delivered the world’s first 5-MW steam turbine to the Commonwealth Edison Co. of Chicago. Subsequent models, which received improvement boosts suggested by GE’s Dr. Sanford Moss, were used mostly as mechanical drives or as peaking units.

大约十年后的1896年，美国发明家查尔斯·柯蒂斯(Charles Curtis)向通用电气公司(General Electric Co.)提出了一项不同的涡轮机发明。到1901年，通用电气已经成功地开发了一台500千瓦的柯蒂斯涡轮发电机，它利用高压蒸汽驱动安装在轴上的圆盘的快速旋转，到1903年，它向芝加哥的联邦爱迪生公司交付了世界上第一台5兆瓦的蒸汽涡轮机。通用电气的桑福德•莫斯(Sanford Moss)博士建议改进后的后续型号，主要用作机械驱动器或调峰装置。

By the early 1900s, coal-fired power units featured outputs in the 1 MW to 10 MW range, outfitted with a steam generator, an economizer, evaporator, and a superheater section. By the 1910s, the coal-fired power plant cycle was improved even more by the introduction of turbines with steam extractions for feedwater heating and steam generators equipped with air preheaters—all which boosted net efficiency to about 15%.

到20世纪初，燃煤发电机组的输出功率在1兆瓦到10兆瓦之间，配备了蒸汽发生器、省煤器、蒸发器和过热器部分。到20世纪10年代，燃煤电厂的循环得到了更大的改善，因为引入了用于给水加热的蒸汽提取涡轮机和配备空气预热器的蒸汽发生器——所有这些都将净效率提高了15%左右。

The demonstration of pulverized coal steam generators at the Oneida Street Station in Wisconsin in 1919 vastly improved coal combustion, allowing for bigger boilers (Figure 3). In the 1920s, another technological boost came with the advent of once-through boiler applications and reheat steam power plants, along with the Benson steam generator, which was built in 1927. Reheat steam turbines became the norm in the 1930s, when unit ratings soared to a 300-MW output level. Main steam temperatures consistently increased through the 1940s, and the decade also ushered in the first attempts to clean flue gas with dust removal. The 1950s and 1960s were characterized by more technical achievements to improve efficiency—including construction of the first once-through steam generator with a supercritical main steam pressure.

1919年，威斯康星州奥奈达街车站的煤粉蒸汽发生器演示极大地改善了煤炭燃烧，允许更大的锅炉(图3)。在20世纪20年代，随着一次性锅炉应用和再热蒸汽发电厂的出现，以及1927年建造的本森蒸汽发生器，又出现了另一项技术进步。20世纪30年代，当机组额定功率飙升至300兆瓦的输出水平时，再热蒸汽轮机成为标准。主蒸汽温度在整个20世纪40年代持续上升，这十年也迎来了第一次尝试用除尘来清洁烟气。20世纪50年代和60年代的特点是在提高效率方面取得了更多的技术成就，包括建造了第一台具有超临界主蒸汽压力的一次性蒸汽发生器。

Purely pulverized. The 40-MW Lakeside Power Plant in St. Francis, Wisconsin, began operations in 1921. This image shows the steam turbines and generators at Lakeside, which was the world’s first plant to burn pulverized coal exclusively. Courtesy: WEC Energy Group 纯粉。位于威斯康星州圣弗朗西斯的40兆瓦湖畔发电厂于1921年开始运行。这张照片显示了湖边的蒸汽轮机和发电机，这是世界上第一个完全燃烧煤粉的工厂。由WEC能源集团提供

Unit ratings of 1,300 MW were reached by the 1970s. In 1972, the world’s first integrated coal gasification combined cycle power plant—a 183-MW power plant for the German generator STEAG—began operations. Mounting environmental concerns and the subsequent passage of the Clean Air Act by the Nixon administration in the 1970s, however, also spurred technical solutions such as scrubbers to mitigate sulfur dioxide emissions. The decade ended with completion of a pioneering commercial fluidized bed combustion plant built on the Georgetown University campus in Washington, D.C., in 1979.

到20世纪70年代，机组额定功率达到1300兆瓦。1972年，世界上第一个综合煤气化联合循环发电厂——为德国steag发电公司建造的183兆瓦发电厂开始运行。然而，日益严重的环境问题以及随后尼克松政府在20世纪70年代通过的《清洁空气法》(Clean Air Act)也刺激了诸如洗涤器等技术解决方案，以减少二氧化硫的排放。1979年，在华盛顿特区的乔治敦大学校园内建成了一个开创性的商业流化床燃烧工厂，这十年结束了。

The early 1980s, meanwhile, were marked by the further development of emissions control technologies, including the introduction of selective catalytic reduction systems as a secondary measure to mitigate nitrogen oxide emissions. Component performance also saw vast improvements during that period to the 21st century. Among the most recent major milestones in coal power’s history is completion of the first large-scale coal-fired power unit outfitted with carbon capture and storage technology in 2014 at Boundary Dam in Saskatchewan, Canada (see sidebar “The 2010s Marked Extraordinary Change for Power”).

与此同时，20世纪80年代初，排放控制技术得到了进一步发展，包括引入选择性催化还原系统，作为减少氮氧化物排放的二级措施。从那个时期到21世纪，组件性能也有了巨大的提高。2014年，加拿大萨斯喀彻温省的边界大坝建成了第一个配备碳捕获和储存技术的大型燃煤发电机组，这是煤电历史上最新的重大里程碑之一(参见侧栏“2010年代标志着电力的非凡变化”)。

The 2010s Marked Extraordinary Change for Power

2010年代标志着权力的非凡变化

Every one of the 13 decades that POWER magazine has been in print has been definitive for electric generation technology, policy, and business in some significant way, but few have been as transformative as the 2010s. The decade opened just as the global economy began to crawl toward recovery from a historically unprecedented downturn that had bludgeoned industrial production and sent global financial markets into chaos.

《电力》杂志出版的13年里，每一年都对发电技术、政策和商业产生了重大影响，但很少有像2010年代那样具有变革性。20世纪90年代伊始，全球经济正从一场前所未有的衰退中缓慢复苏，这场衰退重创了工业生产，并导致全球金融市场陷入混乱。

The ensuing social consciousness fueled an environmental movement, which policymakers championed. Heightened concerns about climate change—driven by a globally embraced urgency to act—propelled energy transformations across the world, resulting in a clear shift in power portfolios away from coal and toward low- or zero-carbon resources. That shift has come with concerted emphasis on flexibility. Effecting a notable cultural change, the decarbonization movement has been championed by power company shareholders and customers, and some of the biggest coal generators in the world have announced ambitions to go net-zero by mid-century.

随之而来的社会意识推动了政策制定者所倡导的环保运动。全球迫切需要采取行动推动能源转型，这加剧了对气候变化的担忧，导致电力组合明显从煤炭转向低碳或零碳资源。这种转变伴随着对灵活性的一致强调。脱碳运动带来了显著的文化变革，得到了电力公司股东和客户的支持，世界上一些最大的煤电厂已经宣布了到本世纪中叶实现净零排放的雄心。

However, the shift has also benefited from a hard economic edge. Transformations, for example, have been enabled by technology innovations that cracked open a vast new realm of natural gas supply, sent the prices of solar panels and batteries plummeting, and made small-scale decentralized generation possible, while the uptake of digitalization has soared, mainly to prioritize efficiency gains.

然而，这种转变也得益于经济上的硬优势。例如，技术创新打开了天然气供应的广阔新领域，使太阳能电池板和电池的价格暴跌，并使小规模分散式发电成为可能，而数字化的采用也大幅增加，主要是为了优先考虑效率的提高。

Disruption continues to define the power industry today. The chaotic global pandemic that jolted the world in 2020 unfolded into a precarious set of energy crises in 2021. After a cold snap prompted mass generation outages across a swath of the central U.S., most prominently in Texas, volatile energy markets and power supply vulnerabilities jacked-up turmoil in California, China, India, and across Europe and Latin America. In 2022, Russia’s occupation of Ukraine and its economic war with the West prompted a new set of energy security concerns that have remained pitted against power affordability and sustainability interests.

今天，电力行业仍然是颠覆性的。2020年震惊世界的混乱的全球大流行在2021年演变成一系列不稳定的能源危机。寒流导致美国中部大片地区(尤其是德克萨斯州)大规模停电，而动荡的能源市场和电力供应的脆弱性加剧了加州、中国、印度以及整个欧洲和拉丁美洲的动荡。2022年，俄罗斯对乌克兰的占领及其与西方的经济战争引发了一系列新的能源安全担忧，这些担忧仍然与电力的可负担性和可持续性利益相冲突。

Gas Power Takes Off

天然气电力开始腾飞

Coal power technology’s evolution was swift owing to soaring power demand and a burgeoning mining sector. The natural gas power sector, which today takes the lion’s share of both U.S. installed capacity and generation, was slower to take off. Although the essential elements of a gas turbine engine were first patented by English inventor John Barber in 1791, it took more than a century before the concepts were really put to practical use.

由于电力需求的飙升和采矿业的蓬勃发展，煤电技术的发展非常迅速。如今在美国装机容量和发电量中占据最大份额的天然气发电行业，起步较慢。尽管燃气涡轮发动机的基本要素在1791年由英国发明家约翰·巴伯(John Barber)首次获得专利，但这些概念真正投入实际应用却花了一个多世纪。

In 1903, Jens William Aegidius Elling, a Norwegian engineer, researcher, and inventor, built the first gas turbine to produce more power than was needed to run its own components. Elling’s first design used both rotary compressors and turbines to produce about 8 kW. He further refined the machine in subsequent years, and by 1912, he had developed a gas turbine system with separate turbine unit and compressor in series, a combination that is still common today.

1903年，挪威工程师、研究员和发明家延斯·威廉·埃吉迪斯·埃林(Jens William Aegidius Elling)建造了第一台燃气轮机，产生的能量超过了运行其自身组件所需的能量。埃林的第一个设计使用了旋转压缩机和涡轮机，产生大约8千瓦的电力。在随后的几年里，他进一步改进了这台机器，到1912年，他已经开发了一个燃气轮机系统，它有独立的涡轮单元和串联的压缩机，这种组合在今天仍然很常见。

Gas turbine technology continued to be enhanced by a number of innovative pioneers from various countries. In 1930, Britain’s Sir Frank Whittle patented a design for a jet engine. Gyorgy Jendrassik demonstrated Whittle’s design in Budapest, Hungary, in 1937. In 1939, a German Heinkel HE 178 aircraft flew successfully with an engine designed by Hans von Ohain that used the exhaust from a gas turbine for propulsion. The same year, Brown Boveri Co. installed the first gas turbine used for electric power generation in Neuchatel, Switzerland. Both Whittle’s and von Ohain’s first jet engines were based on centrifugal compressors.

燃气轮机技术继续得到来自不同国家的一些创新先驱的加强。1930年，英国的弗兰克·惠特尔爵士为一种喷气发动机的设计申请了专利。1937年，Gyorgy Jendrassik在匈牙利布达佩斯展示了惠特尔的设计。1939年，一架德国的Heinkel HE 178飞机成功地使用了汉斯·冯·奥海因(Hans von Ohain)设计的发动机，该发动机利用燃气轮机的废气进行推进。同年，Brown Boveri公司在瑞士纳沙泰尔安装了第一台用于发电的燃气轮机。惠特尔和冯·奥海恩的第一个喷气发动机都是基于离心压缩机的。

Innovations in aircraft technology, and engineering and manufacturing advancements during both World Wars propelled gas power technology to new heights, however. At GE, for example, engineers who participated in development of jet engines put their know-how into designing a gas turbine for industrial and utility service. Following development of a gas turbine-electric locomotive in 1948, GE installed its first commercial gas turbine for power generation—a 3.5-MW heavy-duty unit—at the Belle Isle Station owned by Oklahoma Gas & Electric in July 1949 (Figure 4). Some experts point out that because that unit used exhaust heat for feedwater heating of a steam turbine unit, it was essentially also the world’s first combined cycle power plant. That same year, Westinghouse put online a 1.3-MW unit at the River Fuel Corp. in Mississippi.

然而，两次世界大战期间飞机技术的创新以及工程和制造业的进步将燃气动力技术推向了新的高度。例如，在通用电气，参与喷气发动机开发的工程师将他们的专业知识用于设计用于工业和公用事业服务的燃气轮机。继1948年开发出燃气轮机-电力机车之后，通用电气于1949年7月在俄克拉何马天然气和电力公司拥有的贝尔岛电站安装了第一台用于发电的商用燃气轮机——一台3.5兆瓦的重型机组(图4)。一些专家指出，由于该机组使用废气为蒸汽轮机机组提供给水加热，因此它本质上也是世界上第一个联合循环发电厂。同年，西屋电气公司在密西西比州的River Fuel公司投入了一个1.3兆瓦的机组。

Trailblazer. In 1949, General Electric installed the first gas turbine built in the U.S. for the purpose of generating power at the Belle Isle Station, a 3.5-MW unit, owned by Oklahoma Gas & Electric. Courtesy: GE 开拓者。1949年，通用电气(General Electric)在贝拉岛电站(Belle Isle Station)安装了美国制造的第一台燃气轮机，用于发电，这是一个3.5兆瓦的机组，归俄克拉何马天然气和电力公司所有。礼貌:通用电气

Large heavy-duty gas turbine technology rapidly improved thereafter. In the early 1950s, firing temperatures were 1,300F (705C), by the late 1950s, they had soared to 1,500F, and eventually reached 2,000F in 1975. By 1957, a general surge in gas turbine unit sizes led to the installment of the first heat recovery steam generator (HRSG) for a gas turbine. By 1965, the first fully fired boiler combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) power plant came online, and by 1968, the first CCGT was outfitted with a HRSG. The late 1960s, meanwhile, was characterized by gas turbine suppliers starting to develop pre-designed or standard CCGT plants. GE developed the STAG (steam and gas) system, for example, Westinghouse, the PACE (Power at combined efficiency) system, and Siemens, the GUD (gas and steam) system.

此后，大型重型燃气轮机技术得到迅速发展。在20世纪50年代初，射击温度为1300华氏度(705C)，到20世纪50年代末，它们飙升至1500华氏度，并最终在1975年达到2000华氏度。到1957年，燃气轮机机组尺寸的普遍激增导致安装了第一台用于燃气轮机的热回收蒸汽发生器(HRSG)。到1965年，第一个全燃锅炉联合循环燃气轮机(CCGT)发电厂上线，到1968年，第一个CCGT配备了HRSG。与此同时，20世纪60年代末的特点是燃气轮机供应商开始开发预先设计或标准的CCGT工厂。通用电气开发了STAG(蒸汽和燃气)系统，西屋电气开发了PACE(联合效率发电)系统，西门子开发了GUD(燃气和蒸汽)系统。

The past few decades, meanwhile, have been characterized by a proliferation of large heavy-duty gas turbines that are highly flexible and efficient, and can combust multiple fuels, including high volumes of hydrogen. That development is rooted in a combustion breakthrough in the 1990s that enabled a “lean premixed combustion process.” Compared to the early days of “dry-low NOx” (DLN) technology, when turbine inlet temperatures (TIT) of 1,350C–1,400C (for the vintage F class) were common, the past two decades have ushered in “advanced class” gas turbines with TIT pushing the 1,700C mark.

与此同时，过去几十年的特点是大型重型燃气轮机的激增，这些燃气轮机具有高度的灵活性和效率，可以燃烧多种燃料，包括大量的氢。这一发展源于20世纪90年代在燃烧方面的突破，实现了“精益预混燃烧过程”。与早期“干式低氮氧化物”(DLN)技术相比，当时涡轮进口温度(TIT)为1350 - 1400摄氏度(对于老式F级)是常见的，过去二十年迎来了“先进级”燃气轮机，TIT达到了1700摄氏度。

Advanced gas turbine technology has also led to new world records in CCGT efficiency and gas turbine power output. Specifically, GE Power announced in March 2018 that the Chubu Electric Nishi-Nagoya power plant Block-1, powered by a GE 7HA gas turbine and Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corp.’s steam turbine and generator technology, had been recognized by Guinness World Records as the world’s “most efficient combined-cycle power plant,” based on achieving 63.08% gross efficiency. In August 2022, Duke Energy’s Lincoln Combustion Turbine Station, powered by a Siemens Energy SGT6-9000HL gas turbine, was certified with the official Guinness World Records title for the “most powerful simple-cycle gas power plant” with an output of 410.9 MW.

先进的燃气轮机技术也在CCGT效率和燃气轮机功率输出方面创造了新的世界纪录。具体而言，通用电气电力于2018年3月宣布，由通用电气7HA燃气轮机和东芝能源系统与解决方案公司的蒸汽轮机和发电机技术驱动的中部电气西名古屋电厂Block-1已被吉尼斯世界纪录认定为世界上“最高效的联合循环电厂”，总效率达到63.08%。2022年8月，杜克能源公司的林肯燃烧涡轮站，由西门子能源公司的SGT6-9000HL燃气轮机提供动力，以410.9兆瓦的输出功率获得了“最强大的简单循环燃气发电厂”的吉尼斯世界纪录官方认证。

Atomic Discoveries

原子的发现

Although the concept of the atom was fairly well developed, scientists had not yet figured out how to harness the energy contained in atoms when the first issue of POWER magazine was published. But 13 years later, in 1895, the accidental discovery of X-rays by Wilhelm Röntgen started a wave of experimentation in the atomic field.

虽然原子的概念已经相当发达了，但是当第一期《电力》杂志出版时，科学家们还没有弄清楚如何利用原子中所含的能量。但13年后的1895年，威廉Röntgen偶然发现了x射线，开启了原子领域的实验浪潮。

In the years that followed, radiation was discovered by Antoine Henri Becquerel, a French physicist; the Curies—Marie and Pierre—conducted additional radiation research and coined the term “radioactivity”; and Ernest Rutherford, a New Zealand-born British physicist, who many people consider the father of nuclear science, postulated the structure of the atom, proposed the laws of radioactive decay, and conducted groundbreaking research into the transmutation of elements.

在随后的几年里，法国物理学家安东尼·亨利·贝克勒尔发现了辐射;居里夫人和皮埃尔夫妇进行了进一步的辐射研究，并创造了“放射性”一词;欧内斯特·卢瑟福，出生于新西兰的英国物理学家，被许多人认为是核科学之父，他假设了原子的结构，提出了放射性衰变的规律，并对元素的嬗变进行了开创性的研究。

Many other scientists were helping advance the world’s understanding of atomic principles. Albert Einstein developed his theory of special relativity, E = mc2, where E is energy, m is mass, and c is the speed of light, in 1905. Niels Bohr published his model of the atom in 1913, which was later perfected by James Chadwick when he discovered the neutron.

许多其他科学家也在帮助推进世界对原子原理的理解。1905年，阿尔伯特·爱因斯坦提出了狭义相对论E = mc2，其中E代表能量，m代表质量，c代表光速。尼尔斯·玻尔在1913年发表了他的原子模型，后来詹姆斯·查德威克发现了中子，完善了他的模型。

Enrico Fermi, an Italian physicist, in 1934 showed that neutrons could split atoms. Two German scientists—Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassman—expanded on that knowledge in 1938 when they discovered fission, and using Einstein’s theory, the team showed that the lost mass turned to energy.

1934年，意大利物理学家恩里科·费米证明了中子可以分裂原子。1938年，两位德国科学家奥托·哈恩和弗里茨·斯特拉斯曼发现了裂变，进一步扩展了这一知识，并利用爱因斯坦的理论证明了失去的质量转化为能量。

Early Nuclear Reactors

早期核反应堆

Scientists then turned their attention to developing a self-sustaining chain reaction. To do so, a “critical mass” of uranium needed to be placed under the right conditions. Fermi, who emigrated to the U.S. in 1938 to escape fascist Italy’s racial laws, led a group of scientists at the University of Chicago in constructing the world’s first nuclear reactor.

随后，科学家们将注意力转向开发一种自我维持的连锁反应。要做到这一点，需要将“临界质量”的铀置于适当的条件下。费米于1938年为逃避意大利法西斯的种族法律移民到美国，他带领芝加哥大学的一组科学家建造了世界上第一座核反应堆。

The team’s design consisted of uranium placed in a stack of graphite to make a cube-like frame of fissionable material. The pile, known as Chicago Pile-1, was erected on the floor of a squash court beneath the University of Chicago’s athletic stadium (Figure 5). On December 2, 1942, the first self-sustaining nuclear reaction was demonstrated in Chicago Pile-1.

该团队的设计包括将铀放在一堆石墨中，形成一个立方体状的裂变材料框架。这个桩被称为芝加哥1号桩，被竖立在芝加哥大学体育馆下面的壁球场的地板上(图5)。1942年12月2日，第一次自我维持的核反应在芝加哥1号桩上进行了演示。

World’s first nuclear reactor. Chicago Pile-1 was an exponential pile. At least 29 exponential piles were constructed in 1942 under the West Stands of the University of Chicago’s Stagg Field. Source: U.S. Department of Energy 世界上第一座核反应堆。芝加哥1号堆是一个指数堆。1942年，在芝加哥大学斯塔格球场的西看台下，至少建造了29个指数桩。资料来源:美国能源部

But the U.S. was a year into World War II at the time, and most of the atomic research being done then was focused on developing weapons technology. It was not until after the war that the U.S. government began encouraging the development of nuclear energy for peaceful civilian purposes. The first reactor to produce electricity from nuclear energy was Experimental Breeder Reactor I, on December 20, 1951, in Idaho.

但当时美国已经进入第二次世界大战一年，当时进行的大部分原子研究都集中在开发武器技术上。直到战争结束后，美国政府才开始鼓励为和平民用目的发展核能。第一个利用核能发电的反应堆是1951年12月20日在爱达荷州建造的一号实验增殖反应堆。

The Soviet Union had a burgeoning nuclear power program at the time too. Its scientists modified an existing graphite-moderated channel-type plutonium production reactor for heat and electricity generation. In June 1954, that unit, located in Obninsk, began generating electricity. A few years later, on December 18, 1957, the first commercial U.S. nuclear power plant—Shippingport Atomic Power Station, a light-water reactor with a 60-MW capacity—was synchronized to the power grid in Pennsylvania.

苏联当时也有一个蓬勃发展的核电项目。它的科学家改良了现有的石墨慢化通道型钚生产反应堆，用于热和发电。1954年6月，这个位于奥布宁斯克的装置开始发电。几年后，1957年12月18日，美国第一座商业核电站——shippingport Atomic power Station，一座容量为60兆瓦的轻水反应堆——与宾夕法尼亚州的电网同步。

The U.S. and Soviet Union weren’t the only countries building nuclear plants, however. The UK, Germany, Japan, France, and several others were jumping on the bandwagon too. The industry grew rapidly during the 1960s and 1970s. Nuclear construction projects were on drawing boards across the U.S., with 41 new units ordered in 1973 alone. But slower electricity demand growth, construction delays, cost overruns, and complicated regulatory requirements, put an end to the heyday in the mid-1970s. Nearly half of all planned U.S. projects ended up being canceled. Nonetheless, by 1991 the U.S. had twice as many operating commercial reactors—112 units—as any other country in the world.

然而，美国和苏联并不是唯一建造核电站的国家。英国、德国、日本、法国和其他几个国家也加入了这一行列。该行业在20世纪60年代和70年代迅速发展。美国各地的核电建设项目都在规划阶段，仅1973年就订购了41座新机组。但电力需求增长放缓、建设延误、成本超支以及复杂的监管要求，终结了20世纪70年代中期的全盛时期。美国近一半计划中的项目最终被取消。尽管如此，到1991年，美国运行的商业反应堆数量是世界上任何其他国家的两倍，达到112座。

Nuclear power’s history is tainted by three major accidents. The first was the partial meltdown of Three Mile Island Unit 2 on March 28, 1979. A combination of equipment malfunctions, design-related problems, and worker errors led to the meltdown. The second major accident occurred on April 26, 1986. That event was triggered by a sudden surge of power during a reactor systems test on Unit 4 at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in Ukraine, in the former Soviet Union. The accident and a subsequent fire released massive amounts of radioactive material into the environment.

核电的历史受到三起重大事故的污染。第一次是1979年3月28日三里岛核电站2号机组的部分熔毁。设备故障、设计相关问题和工作人员失误共同导致了熔毁。第二次重大事故发生在1986年4月26日。这一事件是由前苏联乌克兰切尔诺贝利核电站4号机组的反应堆系统测试期间突然发生的电力激增引发的。事故和随后的火灾向环境中释放了大量的放射性物质。

The most-recent major accident occurred following a 9.0-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Japan on March 11, 2011. The quake caused the Fukushima Daiichi station to lose all off-site power. Backup systems worked, but 40 minutes after the quake, a 14-meter-high tsunami struck the area, knocking some of them out. Three reactors eventually overheated—melting their cores to some degree—then hydrogen explosions spread radioactive contamination throughout the area.

最近的一次重大事故发生在2011年3月11日日本沿海发生的9.0级地震之后。地震导致福岛第一核电站失去了所有场外电力。备用系统正常工作，但地震发生40分钟后，一场14米高的海啸袭击了该地区，摧毁了一些人。三个反应堆最终过热，堆芯在一定程度上融化，然后氢爆炸将放射性污染扩散到整个地区。

The consequences of accidents have played a role in decisions to phase out or cut back reliance on nuclear power in some countries including Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, and Spain. Nonetheless, China, Russia, India, the United Arab Emirates, the U.S., and others continue to build new units, incorporating a lot of modern power plant technology (see sidebar “The Rise of IIoT”).

在一些国家，包括比利时、德国、瑞士和西班牙，事故的后果在决定逐步淘汰或减少对核能的依赖方面发挥了作用。尽管如此，中国、俄罗斯、印度、阿联酋、美国和其他国家仍在继续建造新的机组，融合了许多现代电厂技术(参见侧栏“工业物联网的兴起”)。

The Rise of IIoT

工业物联网的兴起

Power plant automation was already well-advanced by 2009, when more facilities shed boiler-turbine generator boards and vertical panels populated with indicators and strip chart recorders, and adopted open systems using industry-standard hardware and software. By then, companies were already beginning to grasp the value of digital modeling and virtual simulation, as well as sensors and wireless technologies.

到2009年，发电厂的自动化已经取得了很大的进步，更多的发电厂抛弃了锅炉涡轮发电机板和装有指示器和条形图记录器的垂直面板，采用了使用工业标准硬件和软件的开放系统。到那时，公司已经开始掌握数字建模和虚拟仿真的价值，以及传感器和无线技术。

The definitive shift arrived around 2012 with the introduction of the concept of the “industrial internet of things” (IIoT)—a term GE claims it coined—which described the connection between machines, advanced analytics, and the people who use them. According to GE, IIoT is “the network of a multitude of industrial devices connected by communications technologies that results in systems that can monitor, collect, exchange, analyze, and deliver valuable new insights like never before. These insights can then help drive smarter, faster business decisions for industrial companies.”

2012年左右，随着“工业物联网”(IIoT)概念的引入，最终的转变到来了——通用电气声称这是它创造的一个术语——它描述了机器、高级分析和使用它们的人之间的联系。根据通用电气的说法，工业物联网是“通过通信技术连接的众多工业设备的网络，从而形成可以监控、收集、交换、分析和提供前所未有的有价值的新见解的系统。”这些见解可以帮助工业企业做出更明智、更快速的商业决策。”

In the power sector, IIoT morphed into a multi-billion-dollar industry, and it has since enabled predictive analytics to forecast and detect component issues; it provides real-time production data (Big Data), which has opened up a realm of possibilities; and enabled software solutions—all of which have boosted efficiency, productivity, and performance. Over the last decade, several companies have rolled out comprehensive power plant–oriented IIoT platforms, such as GE’s Predix and Siemens’ MindSphere, and driven the rapid development of technologies that benefit from them, such as fourth-generation sensors, Big Data, edge intelligence, as well as augmented and virtual reality, and artificial intelligence and machine learning.

在电力行业，工业物联网已经发展成为一个价值数十亿美元的产业，并且已经实现了预测分析来预测和检测组件问题;它提供实时生产数据(大数据)，这开辟了一个可能性的领域;以及启用的软件解决方案——所有这些都提高了效率、生产力和性能。在过去的十年里，几家公司推出了全面的面向发电厂的工业物联网平台，如通用电气的Predix和西门子的MindSphere，并推动了受益于这些平台的技术的快速发展，如第四代传感器、大数据、边缘智能、增强现实和虚拟现实、人工智能和机器学习。

Separately, these and other digital possibilities have opened up a vast intelligence realm for other aspects of the power sector, including for grid—such as for forecasting, grid stability, outage response, distributed energy resource orchestration, communications, and mobility. Components manufacturing, too, is digitally evolving, with advancements in 3D printing, development of new materials, and process intensification.

另外，这些和其他数字可能性已经为电力部门的其他方面(包括电网)开辟了广阔的智能领域，例如预测、电网稳定性、停电响应、分布式能源编排、通信和移动性。随着3D打印技术的进步、新材料的开发和工艺的强化，零部件制造业也在数字化发展。

Renewables: The World’s Oldest and Newest Energy Sources

可再生能源:世界上最古老和最新的能源

While humans have been harnessing energy from the sun, wind, and water for thousands of years, technology has changed significantly over the course of history, and these ancient energy types have developed into state-of-the-art innovative power generation sources.

虽然人类利用太阳能、风能和水能已有数千年的历史，但随着历史的发展，技术也发生了重大变化，这些古老的能源类型已经发展成为最先进的创新发电来源。

Chasing Water. What became modern renewable energy generation got its start in the late 1800s, around the time that POWER launched. Hydropower was first to transition to a commercial electricity generation source, and it advanced very quickly. In 1880, Michigan’s Grand Rapids Electric Light and Power Co. generated DC electricity using hydropower at the Wolverine Chair Co. A belt-driven dynamo powered by a water turbine at the factory lit 16 arc street lamps.

追逐的水。现代可再生能源发电始于19世纪末，大约在POWER推出的时候。水电是第一个转变为商业发电的能源，而且发展非常迅速。1880年，密歇根州的大急流城电灯和电力公司利用金刚狼椅子公司的水力发电产生直流电。工厂里一台由水轮机驱动的皮带发电机点亮了16盏弧形路灯。

Just two years later, the world’s first central DC hydroelectric station powered a paper mill in Appleton, Wisconsin. By 1886, there were 40 to 50 hydroelectric plants operating in the U.S. and Canada alone, and by 1888, roughly 200 electric companies relied on hydropower for at least some of their electricity generation (see sidebar “The Evolution of Power Business Models”). In 1889, the nation’s first AC hydroelectric plant came online, the Willamette Falls Station in Oregon City, Oregon.

仅仅两年后，世界上第一个中央直流水电站为威斯康星州阿普尔顿的一家造纸厂供电。到1886年，仅在美国和加拿大就有40到50座水力发电厂在运行，到1888年，大约有200家电力公司至少部分依靠水力发电(参见侧栏“电力商业模式的演变”)。1889年，美国第一个交流水力发电厂——位于俄勒冈州俄勒冈市的威拉米特瀑布电站投产。

The Evolution of Power Business Models

电力商业模式的演变

The birth of the modern electric utility began when Thomas Edison invented the practical lightbulb in 1878, and, to spur demand for the novel invention, developed an entire power system that generated and distributed electricity. While the concept caught on in several cities in the early years, owing to exorbitant costs, power companies rarely owned several power plants.

现代电力事业的诞生始于1878年托马斯·爱迪生发明了实用的灯泡，为了刺激对这项新发明的需求，他开发了一套完整的发电和配电系统。虽然这一概念在早期的几个城市流行起来，但由于成本过高，电力公司很少拥有几家发电厂。

Samuel Insull, who began his role as president at Chicago Edison in 1892, is credited with first exploiting load factor, not only finding power customers for off-peak times, but leveraging technology including larger generation systems and alternating current to produce and transmit power more cheaply. Crucially, he is also said to have pioneered consolidation; he acquired 20 small utilities by 1907 to give birth to a natural monopoly—Commonwealth Edison.

塞缪尔·因萨尔于1892年开始担任芝加哥爱迪生公司的总裁，他被认为是第一个利用负载系数的人，不仅在非高峰时期找到了电力客户，而且利用了包括大型发电系统和交流电在内的技术，以更低的成本生产和传输电力。最重要的是，据说他也是行业整合的先驱;到1907年，他收购了20家小型公用事业公司，自然垄断了联邦爱迪生公司。

The model was widely emulated, and for decades, scale economies associated with large centralized generation technologies encouraged vertical integration to drive down power costs, encourage universal access, and provide reliability. To enforce the responsibilities and rights of these investor-owned utilities (IOUs) and their customers, however, this approach also spurred more government oversight and regulation. It also gave rise to both municipal ownership, and later, as a New Deal measure, public power to enable rural electrification.

这种模式被广泛效仿，几十年来，与大型集中式发电技术相关的规模经济鼓励了垂直整合，从而降低了电力成本，鼓励了普遍接入，并提供了可靠性。然而，为了加强这些投资者拥有的公用事业(iou)及其客户的责任和权利，这种方法也刺激了更多的政府监督和监管。它还产生了市政所有权，后来，作为新政措施，公共权力使农村电气化成为可能。

Business models began to shift more distinctively starting in the late 1970s, as environmental policy, the oil shocks, and initiatives to open the airline and trucking industries to competition disrupted the status quo. The evolution that happened in the last 40 years, which has left an enduring legacy, is often categorized into two big buckets: the introduction of competition, and reforming the way monopoly utilities operate. A key step to initiating reforms in the U.S. stemmed from passage of the Public Utilities Regulatory Policies Act (PURPA) of 1978, which essentially created opportunities for smaller generators to get into the game.

从20世纪70年代末开始，商业模式开始发生更明显的转变，因为环境政策、石油危机以及向航空和卡车行业开放竞争的举措打破了现状。过去40年发生的变革留下了持久的遗产，人们通常将其分为两大类:引入竞争，以及改革垄断公用事业的运营方式。美国启动改革的关键一步源于1978年《公用事业监管政策法案》(Public Utilities Regulatory Policies Act, PURPA)的通过，该法案实质上为小型发电企业进入这一行业创造了机会。

The final, but just as significant, historical upheaval was energy deregulation. In the 1990s, holding competition as the most effective driver of low power costs, several states also moved to end monopoly protections for retail sales—though after California’s high-profile energy crisis in 2000 and 2001, many scaled back their plans and even re-regulated their retail sectors. Deregulation had the important role of giving rise to new retail companies, whose business models were exclusively focused on delivery of power to the customer.

最后，但同样重要的历史剧变是能源放松管制。在20世纪90年代，竞争是降低电力成本的最有效的驱动因素，一些州也开始结束对零售销售的垄断保护——尽管在2000年和2001年加州高调的能源危机之后，许多州缩减了他们的计划，甚至重新监管他们的零售部门。放松管制在催生新零售公司方面发挥了重要作用，这些公司的商业模式完全专注于向客户输送电力。

If and how these models thrive, however, is questionable. Decarbonization, decentralization, and digitalization—as well as the recent impact from the COVID-19 pandemic—have slackened or prompted a decline in power demand. At the same time, traditional regulatory approaches, which have been predicated on growth, must grapple with an increasingly complex industry landscape. The past decades have ushered in two-way flows of electricity, more stringent environmental policies, and state goals. Regulators are challenged with ensuring power systems are operating efficiently, complying with environmental goals, remain reliable, and address equity issues for low-income customers.

然而，这些模式能否以及如何茁壮成长，还是个问题。脱碳、去中心化和数字化，以及最近COVID-19大流行的影响，已经减缓或促使电力需求下降。与此同时，以增长为基础的传统监管方式必须应对日益复杂的行业格局。在过去的几十年里，电力的双向流动、更严格的环境政策和国家目标已经出现。监管机构面临的挑战是确保电力系统高效运行，符合环境目标，保持可靠性，并解决低收入客户的公平问题。

Internationally, Switzerland was at the forefront of pumped storage, opening the world’s first such plant in 1909. Pumped storage wasn’t integrated into the U.S. energy mix until 1930 when Connecticut Electric Light and Power Co. erected a pumped storage plant in New Milford, Connecticut.

在国际上，瑞士处于抽水蓄能的前沿，于1909年开设了世界上第一个抽水蓄能工厂。抽水蓄能直到1930年康涅狄格电灯和电力公司在康涅狄格的新米尔福德建立抽水蓄能电站后才被纳入美国的能源结构。

Blowing in the Wind. At about the same time that hydropower was gaining popularity, inventors were also figuring out how to use the windmills of the past to generate electricity for the future. In 1888, Charles Brush, an inventor in Ohio, constructed a 60-foot wind turbine in his backyard (Figure 6). The windmill’s wheel was 56 feet in diameter and had 144 blades. A shaft inside the tower turned pulleys and belts, which spun a 12-kW dynamo that was connected to batteries in Brush’s basement.

在风中飘荡。大约在水力发电越来越受欢迎的同时，发明家们也在研究如何利用过去的风车为未来发电。1888年，俄亥俄州的发明家Charles Brush在他的后院建造了一个60英尺高的风力涡轮机(图6)。风车的轮子直径56英尺，有144片叶片。塔内的一个轴转动滑轮和皮带，带动一台12千瓦的发电机，该发电机与Brush地下室的电池相连。

Birth of the wind turbine. In 1888, Charles Brush, an inventor in Ohio, constructed a 60-foot wind turbine capable of generating electricity in his backyard. Source: Wikimedia Commons 风力涡轮机的诞生。1888年，俄亥俄州的发明家查尔斯·布拉什(Charles Brush)在自家后院建造了一座60英尺高的风力涡轮机，能够发电。来源:维基共享资源

Wind-powered turbines slowly and with little fanfare spread throughout the world. The American Midwest, where the turbines were used to power irrigation pumps, saw numerous installations. In 1941, the world saw the first 1.25-MW turbine connected to the grid on a hill in Castleton, Vermont, called Grandpa’s Knob.

风力涡轮机慢慢地、悄无声息地传遍了世界。在美国中西部，涡轮机被用来为灌溉泵提供动力，那里安装了许多涡轮机。1941年，世界上第一个1.25兆瓦的涡轮机在佛蒙特州卡斯尔顿的一个小山上并网，这个小山上被称为爷爷的旋钮。

Interest in wind power was renewed by the oil crisis of the 1970s, which spurred research and development. Wind power in the U.S. got a policy boost when President Jimmy Carter signed the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act of 1978, which required companies to buy a certain amount of electricity from renewable energy sources, including wind.

20世纪70年代的石油危机刺激了风能的研究和开发，人们对风能的兴趣重新燃起。美国总统吉米·卡特(Jimmy Carter)在1978年签署了《公用事业监管政策法案》(Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act)，要求企业从包括风能在内的可再生能源购买一定数量的电力，从而推动了美国的风能发展。

By the 1980s, the first utility-scale wind farms began popping up in California. Europe has been the leader in offshore wind, with the first offshore wind farm installed in 1991 in Denmark. According to Wind Europe, Europe had 236 GW of installed wind capacity at the end of 2021, a significant increase from the 12.6 GW of capacity that was grid-connected five years earlier.

到了20世纪80年代，第一批公用事业规模的风力发电场开始在加州出现。欧洲一直是海上风电的领导者，1991年在丹麦建立了第一个海上风电场。根据欧洲风能公司的数据，到2021年底，欧洲的风电装机容量为236吉瓦，比五年前并网的12.6吉瓦的装机容量有了显着增长。

In late 2016, the first offshore wind farm in the U.S., a five-turbine, 30-MW project, began operation in the waters off of Block Island, Rhode Island. Yet, by 2022, only one additional offshore wind project had been added to the U.S. grid—the two-turbine Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind pilot project with a generating capacity of 12 MW. However, onshore wind installations have fared much better. By mid-2022, more than 139 GW of onshore wind capacity was grid-connected in the U.S., according to American Clean Power, a renewable energy advocacy group.

2016年底，美国第一个海上风电场，一个5台涡轮机，30兆瓦的项目，在罗德岛布洛克岛附近的水域开始运行。然而，到2022年，只有一个额外的海上风电项目加入了美国电网——两个涡轮机的弗吉尼亚海岸海上风电试点项目，发电量为12兆瓦。然而，陆上风力发电的情况要好得多。根据可再生能源倡导组织美国清洁能源(American Clean Power)的数据，到2022年年中，美国陆上风电装机容量将超过139吉瓦并网。

Let the Sunshine In. Compared to other commercially available renewable energy sources, solar power is in its infancy, though the path that led to its commercial use began almost 200 years ago. In 1839, French scientist Edmond Becquerel discovered the photovoltaic (PV) effect by experimenting with an electrolytic cell made of two metal electrodes in a conducting solution. Becquerel found that electricity generation increased when it was exposed to light.

让阳光照进来。与其他商业上可用的可再生能源相比，太阳能还处于起步阶段，尽管其商业应用的道路始于近200年前。1839年，法国科学家Edmond Becquerel在导电溶液中对由两个金属电极制成的电解电池进行实验，发现了光伏(PV)效应。贝克勒尔发现，当它暴露在光线下时，发电量会增加。

More than three decades later, an English electrical engineer named Willoughby Smith discovered the photoconductivity of selenium. By 1882 the first solar cell was created by New York inventor Charles Fritts, who coated selenium with a layer of gold to develop a cell with an energy conversion rate of just 1–2%.

三十多年后，一位名叫威洛比·史密斯的英国电气工程师发现了硒的光导电性。1882年，纽约发明家查尔斯·弗里茨(Charles Fritts)发明了第一块太阳能电池，他在硒上涂上一层金，开发出能量转化率仅为1-2%的电池。

It wasn’t until the 1950s, however, that silicon solar cells were produced commercially. Physicists at Bell Laboratories determined silicon to be more efficient than selenium. The cell created by Bell Labs was “the first solar cell capable of converting enough of the sun’s energy into power to run everyday electrical equipment,” according to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).

然而，直到20世纪50年代，硅太阳能电池才开始商业化生产。贝尔实验室的物理学家确定硅比硒更有效。根据美国能源部(DOE)的说法，贝尔实验室发明的这种电池是“第一个能够将足够的太阳能转化为电能以运行日常电气设备的太阳能电池”。

By the 1970s, the efficiency of solar cells had increased, and they began to be used to power navigation warning lights and horns on many offshore gas and oil rigs, lighthouses, and railroad crossing signals. Domestic solar applications began to be viewed as sensible alternatives in remote locations where grid-connected options were not affordable.

到20世纪70年代，太阳能电池的效率提高了，它们开始被用于为许多海上天然气和石油钻井平台上的导航警示灯和喇叭、灯塔和铁路交叉信号供电。在偏远地区，家用太阳能开始被视为明智的选择，因为这些地区无法负担并网的选择。

The 1980s saw significant progress in the development of more-efficient, more-powerful solar projects. In 1982, the first PV megawatt-scale power station, developed by ARCO Solar, came online in Hesperia, California. Also in 1982, the DOE began operating Solar One, a 10-MW central-receiver demonstration project, the first project to prove the feasibility of power tower technology. Then, in 1992, researchers at the University of South Florida developed a 15.9%-efficient thin-film PV cell, the first to break the 15% efficiency barrier. By the mid-2000s, residential solar power systems were available for sale in home improvement stores.

20世纪80年代，在开发更高效、更强大的太阳能项目方面取得了重大进展。1982年，由ARCO太阳能公司开发的首个兆瓦级光伏电站在加州赫斯佩里亚上线。同样在1982年，美国能源部开始运营Solar One，这是一个10兆瓦的中央接收器示范项目，是第一个证明电力塔技术可行性的项目。然后，在1992年，南佛罗里达大学的研究人员开发了一种效率为15.9%的薄膜光伏电池，这是第一个突破15%效率障碍的电池。到2000年代中期，家用太阳能发电系统已经可以在家装店买到。

In 2016, solar power from utility-scale facilities accounted for less than 0.9% of U.S. electricity generation. However, the solar industry has gained significant momentum since then. According to the Solar Energy Industries Association, there was more than 126 GW of solar power capacity installed in the U.S. at the end of March 2022, and the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported that almost 4% of U.S. electricity came from solar energy in 2021. (For more details on the history of all power generation types, see supplements associated with this issue at powermag.com.) 

2016年，来自公用事业规模设施的太阳能发电量占美国发电量的比例不到0.9%。然而，自那以后，太阳能产业获得了显著的发展势头。根据太阳能产业协会的数据，截至2022年3月底，美国太阳能装机容量超过126吉瓦，美国能源情报署报告称，2021年美国近4%的电力来自太阳能。(有关所有发电类型历史的更多详细信息，请参阅powermag.com与此问题相关的补充资料。)

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